Final Report > Chapter 2: The Conduct of the Inquiry > Features of a Public Inquiry > Whether an Inquiry should be a Public Inquiry

Whether an Inquiry should be a Public Inquiry

5 Many Inquiries set up by government take place in private. This may be right in the circumstances. Public Inquiries, by contrast, have tended to be reserved for those matters of greatest public outcry. For the future we are persuaded that the public interest demands that the criteria which guide the decision whether an Inquiry should be held in public or private should be made more explicit. The decision should not, for example, depend on some measures of public outcry, since the public may not always know of or recognise the need for concern, yet the issue at stake may be of great public importance. Nor should the decision necessarily rest on criteria such as the need for speedy deliberation and action, or the cost involved.

6 In the area of healthcare, there has been a tendency to opt for holding Inquiries in private. It has commonly been thought that this best reflects the public interest, in that people's feelings would be spared. It has also been suggested that enquiring in private is more conducive to getting at the real truth. Our experience suggests that these assumptions are misplaced. Holding an Inquiry in private is more likely to inflame than protect the feelings of those affected by the Inquiry, not least because of the notion of secrecy and exclusion which it fosters. Furthermore, the public's confidence in the organisation or service under review, or indeed in government as a whole, is unlikely to be enhanced, if they, and particularly the press, are excluded.

7 Currently, we note that the call for a Public Inquiry when something appears to have gone wrong is becoming increasingly common. This would appear to be a consequence of there being no clear criteria or guidance, for government or the public, which analyses what Inquiries are for and about, when they are justified, and whether and why they should be in public or private. We see an urgent need for the development of such guidance. [3] We welcome, therefore, the beginning of this process in the field of healthcare. The document, `Building a Safer NHS for Patients' proposes that a Public Inquiry may be established by the Secretary of State for Health: `where a service failure results in serious harm to larger numbers of patients, where there is serious national concern, or where a major issue of ethics or policy is raised for the first time by an incident'. [4]

Footnotes

[3] See the paper prepared by the Rt Hon The Lord Howe of Aberavon, CH, QC for presentation to the British Association Annual Festival of Science, Cardiff, on 7 September 1998: `The Management of Public Inquiries'

[4] `Building a Safer NHS for Patients: implementing an organisation with a memory' London: Department of Health, 2001