What’s next for public inquiries?

What’s next for public inquiries? The House of Lords Statutory Inquiries Committee report and the Government’s response

On 10 February 2025, the UK Government published its response to the House of Lords Statutory Inquiries Committee’s September 2024 Report “Public Inquiries: Enhancing public trust”. In this article we examine the report along with the Government response and consider what might come next for public inquiries.

The Report

On 16 September 2024, the House of Lords Statutory Inquiry Committee published the 63-page report ‘Public inquiries: Enhancing public trust’, (‘the Report’) which considered, in detail, the efficacy of the law and practice relating to statutory public inquiries held under the Inquiries Act 2005.[1] The House of Lords had previously considered the operation of the Inquiries Act 2005 in 2014, publishing the report The Inquiries Act 2005: post-legislative scrutiny (‘the 2014 Report’). 

In establishing the 2024 Committee it was noted that in the 10 years since the 2014 Report, the number and complexity of inquiries had increased without any tangible improvements to their length, methodology, cost, follow-up on recommendations or common infrastructure. [2] 

After receiving oral and written evidence and submissions, the Committee made 9 new recommendations and re-iterated 26 previous recommendations from the 2014 Report.  

In summary, the recommendations relate to 4 broad areas: 

1. Inquiry establishment and design

The Committee noted that ministerial decisions in the establishment of an inquiry can be key to its overall efficiency and effectiveness.[3] In setting up an inquiry, Ministers should therefore consider:

• statutory and non-statutory inquiry formats, and whether inquiries should be judge-led or non-judge/expert led, with either a single chair or a panel, on a case-by-case basis; [4] 
• where appropriate, consulting with and involving inquiry victims or survivors on an inquiry’s terms of reference, and provide guidance to those setting up inquiries on options for involving those groups; [5]  
• including an indicative deadline for the final inquiry report in the terms of reference (with ministerial approval to extend the deadline);[6]  and
• including a requirement that inquiries provide regular, public updates on their work and consider publication of interim reports (particularly where the inquiry is likely be lengthy).[7]  

2. The accepted recommendations of the 2014 Report should be put into effect:  

The Committee built on the work of the 2014 Report, noting that of the 33 previous recommendations, 19 were accepted, 14 were rejected and of those accepted, none were, in fact, subsequently implemented.[8]  As a consequence the Committee reiterated 26 of the previous 2014 Report recommendations and recommended that the Government act as required to:

• introduce primary legislation to implement those 2014 Report recommendations;
• identify and draft changes to the Inquiry Rules 2006; and 
• swiftly implement any recommendations that did not require primary or secondary legislation.[9]

The Committee also recommended that the Liaison Committee of the House of Lords monitor the implementation of the Committee’s most recent recommendations.[10]

3. Inquiry recommendations must be effectively monitored to ensure implementation

The Committee found that ‘implementation monitoring is an essential—but currently neglected—part of the inquiry process’[11]  and recommended that a new, joint, select committee of Parliament (‘the Public Inquiries Committee’) or a sessional committee of the House of Lords be established to:

• monitor and publish reports on the implementation of accepted inquiry recommendations; 
• make recommendations to the Inquiries Unit of the Cabinet Office;
• scrutinise Government responses to inquiries;
• conduct thematic research and meta-analysis of recommendations to multiple inquiries; and
• identify systemic policy failures and prevent future disasters.[12]

4. The role of the Cabinet Office’s Inquiries Unit must be enhanced to ensuring the sharing of best practice: 

The 2014 Report recommended the creation of a Central Inquiries Unit. In the Report, the Committee noted that there was still a perception that new inquiries were ‘re-invent[ing] the wheel’ [13]  and that the sharing best practice between inquiries – and learning from past inquiries – is absolutely essential,[14]. It recommended that: 

• Inquiry terms of reference contain an obligation to produce a lessons-learnt paper and a working paper on what went well and what could be improved, and 
• those reports be written as the inquiry progresses and submitted, with the inquiry report, to the Inquiries Unit and the new (proposed) Public Inquiries Liaison Committee of Parliament;[15]   
• the existing Inquiries Unit be sufficiently resourced to create a wider ‘community of practice’ for all public inquiries, with a forum for sharing best practices; 
• a form of the Handbook for Inquiry Chairs and Secretaries be made publicly available; and 
• inquiries utilise policy-making and civil service expertise to assist inquiry chairs and ensure reports make practicable recommendations.[16]

The Response

The Government’s ‘Response to the House of Lords Statutory Inquiries Committee Report: Enhancing Public trust’ (‘the Response’) was published on 10 February 2025. [17] 

The Response addresses each of the Report’s recommendations. Of the 9 ‘new’ recommendations, the Government accepted 6 relating to: 

• the establishment and conduct of inquiries (ie. there is no ‘one size fits all’ approach to establishing inquiries), 
• consultation by Ministers with those affected, victims and survivors on terms of reference, 
• the setting of indicative deadlines, by Ministers, within terms of reference, 
• the publishing of interim reports by inquiries,
• the production of lessons learnt reports by inquiry secretaries,
• the sharing of best practice between inquiry teams by the Inquiries Unit and the publication of public guidance.  

The 3 recommendations not accepted were:

1. The recommendations of the 2014 Report that required the introduction of primary legislation or changes to the Inquiry Rules. 

2. That the Liaison Committee of the House of Lords should monitor the implementation of the Committee’s recommendations.  The Response confirmed that the Government would commit to publishing guidance on inquiries and would provide a further update to Parliament on its ‘intentions for any wider reforms of the frameworks around inquiries’.

3. That implementation monitoring be taken forward by a new ‘Public Inquiries Liaison Committee’ Again, the Response noted this was a recommendation for Parliament and repeated their commitment to ‘wider reforms of the frameworks around inquiries’.

The Response further stated that the Government is also considering ‘whether there is scope for wider reforms to the frameworks within which inquiries are set up, run and concluded…particularly in the context of both the Independent Public Advocate and a statutory duty of candour’.[18]  This hints that change may be on the horizon, however, the details at this stage as to what this may look like are very limited. 

The Response also considered the 26 reiterated recommendations from the 2014 Report, of which: 

• 9 were accepted, 
• 1 was marked ‘partially accept’ – on the basis the Government would commit to publishing guidance; 
• 8 were marked as ‘under consideration’ – as part of the broader Government review into ‘whether wider changes are needed to the frameworks around inquiries’; 
• 6 were marked as ‘unable to accept’ – on the basis that they were not required, would require legislative changes, would come into conflict with the Government's wider legal obligations, or would reduce the flexibility and influence of Ministers; and 
• 2 were said to be ‘already implemented’ – being those relating to the establishment of the Inquiries Unit in 2019.

Our thoughts on what comes next

Wider reform of the framework around inquiries 

There are currently 20 active statutory inquiries,[19]  with further statutory inquiries being called for on a regular basis.  In February 2025 alone, there were renewed calls for a statutory inquiry in Oldham [20]  and confirmation from the government that a statutory inquiry into the Nottingham attacks would be established ‘within weeks’. We have also seen calls in the press this past fortnight for a statutory inquiry into the death of Sir David Amess MP. 

The recent Response hints that future developments in this area are likely to be as part of a ‘wider reform of the framework around inquiries’. Just exactly what this wider reform looks like is unclear.  But with the 16 January 2025 announcement by the Home Secretary of five possible ‘locally-led’ non-statutory inquiries into sexual abuse and grooming gangs,  it seems possible that the Government may advance reforms that focus on non-statutory inquiries or independent reviews as the preferred model to statutory inquiries, in certain circumstances, going forward.

However as public knowledge and understanding of inquiries continues to grow, one thing seems clear – inquiries will remain a mechanism for the investigation of major events of public concern for some time yet.

TLT’s Public Inquiries and Public Law team has significant experience working on statutory and non-statutory inquiries and independent reviews. To discuss the subject matter of this article further or for assistance with public inquiries, non-statutory inquiries or independent reviews in general, reach out to our team of expert lawyers. 

Authors: Catherine Turtle, Partner and Laura Smith, Senior Associate.  

Contributor: Hershil Patel, Associate.

[1]  Public inquiries: Enhancing public trust,[1].

[2] New committee activity in 2024, [26].

[3] September 2024 Report, [13].

[4] September 2024 Report, [46].

[5] September 2024 Report, [55].

[6] September 2024 Report, [58].

[7] September 2024 Report, [62].

[8] September 2024 Report, [64].

[9] September 2024 Report, [74].

[10] September 2024 Report, [75].

[11] September 2024 Report, [115].

[12] September 2024 Report, [116].

[13] September 2024 Report, [120].

[14] September 2024 Report, [137].

[15] September 2024 Report, [139].

[16] September 2024 Report, [140].

[17] Hansard, House of Commons, 10 February 2025, Public Inquiries: Enhancing Public Trust - Hansard - UK Parliament.

[18] Government Response to the House of Lords Statutory Inquiries Committee report: Enhancing public trust (HTML) - GOV.UK

[19] See Neil Johnson, ‘Statutory public inquiries: Inquiries Act 2005’, House of Commons Library, 4 November 2024, [5.1]. Mr Johnson notes that as at 4 November 2024 there were 17 active 2005 Act inquiries. Since then three further inquiries have been announced including the inquiry into the murder of Sean Brown, the inquiry into events in Southport attacks in 2024 and the inquiry into the Nottingham attacks in 2024.

[20] Charlotte Hall and George Lythgoe, BBC News, ‘Council demands statutory child sex abuse inquiry’, Oldham Council demands statutory public inquiry into child sex abuse in town - BBC News, 13 February 2025.

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