THE parents of a teenager who died during a caving trip have revealed they will not let his younger brother go on a similar expedition.

An inquest last week concluded that Tadcaster Grammar School pupil Joe Lister drowned in Manchester Hole in Upper Nidderdale, after water surged over the top of a nearby reservoir into the cave system that he and his school friends were exploring.

The narrative verdict left the possibility of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) bringing criminal charges.

Joe's parents, Martin and Paula Lister, of Steeton, near Tadcaster, believe the group should never have been in Manchester Hole, where their son went missing in an underground tunnel while trying to escape rising waters, in the first place.

Mr Lister said he would not be prepared to let Joe's younger brother, 12-year-old Ben, go on a similar outing.

"Obviously, this has left us uncomfortable about these sort of trips - we'd be lying if we said it hadn't," he said.

"We wouldn't want Ben to go on something like that now. You accept accidents like bumps and scrapes can happen, but we could never have envisaged something like this.

"It's difficult to get away from what happened because there is still a long way to go, but we accept that.

"All we want is for whatever is done now to be done properly - because it must never happen again."

He said the family was not pointing the finger at anybody, but simply wanted appropriate action to be taken so what happened to Joe can never happen to anybody else.

He said the family was prepared for a wait before discovering if legal action was planned.

"We are getting through this because we have a fantastic, close family, and we just have to wait and see what the HSE decides. We can't look any further ahead than that.

"The crux is that if Joe's group hadn't gone into the cave, this would never have happened, and three independent experts told the inquest they would not have entered Manchester Hole given the weather conditions on the day Joe died.

"There was plenty of evidence that what happened could have been predicted.

"We know there is an element of risk in outings like this and we have no qualms with that.

"We have never said we want school trips to be stopped or tried to tell other parents what to do, but dangers have to be properly assessed and dealt with.

"Before the trip, we went to a meeting at Joe's school and heard about the activities he would be doing, including caving, and we never even considered not letting him go. Joe was keen to be part of it because that was the kind of active boy he was."