National Preventive Mechanism Sixth Annual Report 2014–15 The Children’s Commissioner for England (CCE) commissioned an evidence review of where children are placed in detention and care settings in England, and the legal and regulatory/inspection frameworks that govern their placement in each setting, to identify any gaps. CCE also developed a project looking at isolation in the secure estate for children and young people, and conducted a data collection exercise to inform fieldwork in the following year. As part of its visit function, CCE made unannounced visits to eight establishments in the children’s custodial estate, one unannounced visit to a secure children’s home providing welfare accommodation only, and one announced visit to a secure mental health inpatient unit for children. The Care and Social Services Inspectorate Wales (CSSIW) continued to work in partnership with colleagues from HIW to monitor, inspect and improve the operation of the deprivation of liberty safeguards in Wales. Training was delivered to existing and new inspectors to reinforce their understanding of their responsibilities in monitoring the operation of the safeguards, with a particular focus on awareness of de facto detention. CSSIW was invited to join the ‘Leadership Group’ established by the Welsh Government to consider the implications of the Cheshire West judgment. CSSIW is actively raising the importance of the NPM role in this group, as well as more broadly through internal and external communications. CSSIW developed new inspection frameworks for its inspections of regulated services and local authority social services. These include quality judgement frameworks and are focused on an assessment of the effectiveness of social services and social care in supporting good outcomes for people. They include explicit consideration of the extent to which the care and support provided helps to secure rights and entitlements for people. Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons for Scotland (HMIPS) revised the standards it had used for its inspections since 2006, which it considered no longer adequately reflected the requirements of prison inspections. Practitioners (including other NPM members), academics and others with an interest in human rights and how prisons are run, were consulted and the new standards were published in March 2015.98 The standards place greater emphasis on engaging prisoners in decision-making, improving evaluation of the clarity of purpose and priorities of the prison, and assessing relationships both within the prison and with external agencies and communities, and include specific human rights indicators. New legislation gave HMIPS the responsibility for the monitoring of prisons in Scotland (the role previously carried out by Visiting Committees), and HMIPS made preparations for the implementation of this role (from September 2015) by recruiting volunteer Independent Prison Monitors. During the year, Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary in Scotland (HMICS) embarked on a new inspection programme, which will contribute to the implementation of OPCAT in police custody in Scotland. This followed a thematic inspection of police 98 HM Inspectorate of Prisons for Scotland (2015), Standards for inspecting and monitoring prisons in Scotland, at: http://www.gov.scot/Publications/2015/03/8256/0 (accessed 14/10/15). 56