Page 24 - When Things Go Wrong

would “give it access to all the necessary expertise and at the same time give
it the necessary degree of independence”.
45

2.12 The Institute for Government recommend that the unit should be housed within
the Cabinet Office. This recommendation was partially premised on the fact
46
that the Cabinet Office is less vulnerable to change or dissolution than other
Departments. The Cabinet Office, with its largely inward-looking remit, is also
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ostensibly less likely to be implicated in the course of an inquiry. The
Working Party agrees that the Cabinet Office is an appropriate location for
these responsibilities and will provide the right balance of influence and
insulation.

2.13 However, in order to enhance independence and the quality of decision-
making, we recommend that a Central Inquiries Unit is supported by an
Independent Advisory Board. The Ministerial Council on Deaths in Custody,
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with its multi-tiered structure, provides an instructive model. The Board
should include representation from bereaved people and survivors of
catastrophic events. Membership of the Independent Advisory Board
should be published.

2.14 Appointments to the Independent Advisory Board should be determined
through open competition, administered by the relevant team in the Cabinet
Office. As with appointments to the Judicial Appointments Commission, there
should be a set quota for the number of seats allocated to each professional
grouping. Groups represented on the Board should include former inquiry
chairs; retired civil servants/public officials; NGO or frontline representatives;
legal practitioners; academics; and “lay” members, with appropriate
representation of race and gender.

45 Select Committee on the Inquiries Act, supra note 30, para 172.
46 Norris and Shepheard, supra note 21, p. 33.
47 This may not always follow. Having replaced the Department of Health and Social Care as the
sponsoring department for the Infected Blood Inquiry precisely because of the perceived conflict of
interest, the Cabinet Office was obliged to issue a formal apology in October 2018 for its failure to
ensure that other Government Departments did not destroy material relevant to the inquiry. See Brian
Williams, Letter to Brian Stanton (18 October 2018).
48 The Ministerial Council on Deaths in Custody consists of three tiers: a Ministerial Board on Deaths
in Custody; an Independent Advisory Panel (IAP); and a Practitioner and Stakeholder Group.
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