Oral evidence: Prison reform, HC 548

Oral evidence, 15 November 2016.

Chair

Good morning. This is a meeting of the Justice Select Committee. We were proposing to use today for our first evidence session in our inquiry into prison reform. Unfortunately, we are not able to have that evidence session. We were proposing to take evidence from the six governors of the reform prisons that have been established. As I am sure is understandable, they have had to return to their establishments because of the 24-hour action that is being taken by the Prison Officers Association. Naturally, the safety and good order of their establishments have to come first. For that reason, we are not able to proceed with today’s evidence session. We will reschedule it in due course and that will be notified. We are continuing with the work of the inquiry. Today we will publish on our website the significant amounts of written evidence that we have had so far. The next evidence session that we have scheduled will be with the Minister and the director of NOMS—the National Offender Management Service. I hope that that will proceed as intended. I offer apologies to those who were hoping to see this session. It is something that neither we nor the witnesses who intended to come before us could control. I am afraid that that is the end of probably our shortest ever session. Thank you.