Section five Appendices Currently, only two of the 21 members of the NPM have any reference to their OPCAT mandate written into the legislation that created them and which defines their role. The Police and Fire Reform (Scotland) Act 2012 and the Public Services Reform (Inspection and Monitoring of Prisons) (Scotland) Order 2014 set out that the purpose of independent custody visiting and the functions of HM Chief Inspector of Prisons for Scotland respectively are “pursuant to the objective of OPCAT”. The NPM itself is not recognised more generally in any legislation and has no separate legal identity. In 2015 the members of the NPM themselves decided to create a distinct role for the Chair of the NPM, independent of the other members of the NPM and, I am pleased to report, selected and appointed me without any involvement from the UK Government. However, the Chair, like the NPM itself, is also not recognised in legislation (nor given any of the required powers, immunities or status). You will note in our letter to the government (attached, 13 January) we have set out in detail why we believe this matters. This year the Government introduced legislation, the Prisons and Courts Bill, which would have strengthened the legislative basis of HM Chief Inspector of Prisons and referred specifically to the OPCAT role (clause 2, proposed amendment to the Prison Act 1952, extract attached) but the legislation fell when the Government called an election and the Government has stated that it does not intend to bring that before Parliament again in the near future. We suggested to the Government and Bill Committee that they could use that legislation to recognise the UK’s NPM55 and we drafted a short amendment to that Bill (attached) but unfortunately the Government did not take up that suggestion. It was, however, promoted by the Opposition in Parliament. We have also raised the need for NPM legislation with the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights and Justice Committee,56 who supported this proposal.57 Separately you may remember that there was a complaint to the Subcommittee that one of our members (the Independent Monitoring Boards, IMB) was subject to unjustified interference by the UK Government (by “sacking” the local chair) and we wrote to you about this. This coincided with a review of the governance arrangements for the IMB and we wrote to the Minister concerned to raise the need for greater separation between the IMB secretariat and the Ministry of Justice (letter of 24 January 2017 attached) and met with him to discuss the issues. Although we never received a substantive written reply to our specific 55 Public Bill Committee, Written evidence submitted by John Wadham, Chair of the UK National Preventive Mechanism (PCB 08) at https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201617/cmpublic/PrisonsCourts/memo/PCB08.htm 56 Oral evidence to the Justice Committee, http://data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/ evidencedocument/justice-committee/prison-reform/oral/46581.html; Written evidence from the UK NPM to the Justice Committee, http://data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/evidencedocument/justice-committee/ prison-reform/written/45906.html, January 2017; Written evidence from the UK NPM to the JCHR http://data.parliament. uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/evidencedocument/human-rights-committee/mental-health-and-deaths-inprison/written/48220.html, March 2017 57 Justice Committee’s 14th Report – Prison Reform: Part 1 of the Prisons and Courts Bill, HC 1150, 28 April 2017; Topical Questions, 25 April 2017, Hansard Volume 624. 53