North Wales Abuse Allegations

Baroness Hamwee Excerpts

Tuesday 6th November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hamwee]

My Lords, one area which has not been mentioned in the Statement is support for the victims. Justice will be one form of reparation, but can the Minister say anything about any other form of support that will be given to individuals?

Quite separately, following the question about what is meant by inquiring,

“whether the Waterhouse inquiry was properly constituted and did its job”,

can the Minister assure the House that for every inquiry—I am not talking only about police inquiries—there will be consultation as to its terms so that the best, most proper terms are put in place? If the remit is not right then the outcome will tend not to be right. In this case, for instance, the involvement of the Children’s Commissioner in the terms of the inquiry seems quite obvious.

[Lord Taylor of Holbeach]

I thank my noble friend for her questions. Clearly, the victims are at the heart of this inquiry and providing them with the confidence to come forward is one of the most important things that we can do. I hope that we in this House will echo the wishes of the Home Secretary by giving that support.

The terms of reference of inquiries are very important to the outcomes they produce. I am particularly concerned that we make sure that the original inquiry in North Wales, the Waterhouse inquiry, was indeed set up in such a way. The noble Baroness, Lady Smith, asked about that but I did not reply to her. However, my noble friend has given me the opportunity to do so. We must make sure that that inquiry addressed the right issues. We now have an opportunity to revisit the inquiry and to make sure that it was not too restrictive in what it was seeking to do.