Child Abuse Inquiry

Duncan Hames Excerpts

Monday 3rd November 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mrs May]

As I said when I made the statement in July and as I have repeated here today, I have been very clear to all the agencies involved that it is the expectation and the intention that they should make evidence available to the inquiry. Of course, as has been mentioned, the chair will have to consider whether this is a non-statutory or a statutory inquiry with the powers to compel witnesses that a statutory inquiry would have. I wish to reiterate that, across the whole of Government, we have an opportunity to address this issue, find out what happened in the past, find out the failings and ensure that we learn the lessons for the future, and that is what I expect every part of Government to do.

[Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)]

I thank the Home Secretary for her statement and her support for this inquiry and look forward to the publication of the Wanless and Whittam report next week. Will she confirm that the reasons for the delay in the publication of that report are exclusively those that she gave in her statement and that officials in her Department are not engaged in redacting any material from that report that they do not consider suitable for placing in the public domain?

[Mrs May]

I can assure my hon. Friend that there are two reasons why the report has not yet been published. One is, as I said in my statement, that it is important that it is published separately and on its own, so that people can look at it and then look at this statement and what I have announced today and consider them both properly. Receiving a report of this sort is not just a formality. I have had to consider it and I have asked some questions to ensure that it has addressed the terms of reference that were given.