Coroner Judge Nicholas Loraine-Smith today delivered “unlawful killing” verdicts for the deaths after a six-week long hearing.

Loraine-Smith said: “I accept there were deficiencies – some of them appreciable. But there was not a clear direct causal link between them and their [the victims’] deaths. The what-ifs are endless.

“The police were at best shambolic and at worst cowardly and certainly completely ineffective.

“Nothing that the hotel might have done or could have done would have more than possibly made a difference.

“Armed guards could not have done much to deal with a terrorist armed with a Kalashnikov.”

Loraine-Smith mentioned a “large number of deficiencies” including insufficient guards at the hotel – there were only three guards on duty at the time of the attack – as well as not having enough CCTV cameras and a lack of an evacuation plan.