JUSTICE and Haemophilia Scotland to give evidence to Lords Statutory Inquiries Committee

• Stephanie Needleman, Legal Director, JUSTICE
• Bill Wright, Co-chair, Haemophilia Scotland.

This evidence session, which is open to the public, will be held in Committee Room 2 of the House of Lords and streamed live and on demand on Parliament TV. 

Questions likely to be asked in this session include:

• What is the proper role of victims and survivors within a public inquiry?
• How effectively are victims and survivors currently involved in the inquiry process?
• Which provisions in the Inquiries Act 2005 are the most, or least, helpful at ensuring a statutory inquiry properly involves victims and survivors?
• Should the experience and role of victims and survivors within a public inquiry be improved? If so, how?
• The committee has heard how a newly established inquiry often relies on the collective experience of its secretariat in its early stages. Is the chair and secretariat of an inquiry sufficiently knowledgeable about properly involving victims and survivors?
• Would the recommendations made in this House’s 2014 report help make the experience of victims and survivors better?

Last month the committee published its call for evidence and is inviting the public to give their views on:

• How the Inquiries Act 2005 might be improved.
• Whether statutory inquiries are as effective as they can be.
• What challenges and risks they face, and how they might be improved.
• Whether the system set up under the Inquiries Act 2005 is the best for running inquiries, and when other methods work better.

More about the Statutory Inquiries Committee

The Inquiries Act 2005 forms the statutory framework for many public inquiries. The Statutory Inquiries Committee is considering the law and practice of the way those inquiries work. 

Inquiries are generally set up to consider incidents of major public concern. Their job is: 

• to find out what happened, 
• to learn lessons so that mistakes are not repeated, 
• to restore public confidence, and  
• to determine accountability. 

There are currently 15 inquiries being undertaken under the Inquiries Act 2005.  Concern is often expressed about the length of time inquiries take, and the amount they cost.

Other criticisms are that there is no formal system for following up their recommendations for improvement, and that there is no central team responsible for setting up and running inquiries.