Examination of Witnesses (Questions 500
- 519)
WEDNESDAY 18 OCTOBER 2000
RT HON
PAUL BOATENG,
MP, MR MARTIN
NAREY, MR
JOHN PODMORE
AND MR
TOM MURTAGH
500. Would Mr Bartlett have been appointed if
he had said, "I don't want to search"?
(Mr Murtagh) The situation never arose.
501. Would a search have taken place if he had
not requested formally that it take place?
(Mr Murtagh) In my view a search would have taken
place because that decision had been made at a higher level. I
could not envisage circumstances where a governor, confronted
with the information provided as a basis for this, would have
said, "We should not have a search."
502. You would need prison specific information
of very high quality to justify such a request to be made, would
you not?
(Mr Murtagh) Can you define what you mean by that?
503. You have told us that the information you
had was such, as I understand it, that you cannot conceive that
an alternative decision would have been made.
(Mr Murtagh) We had sufficient reasons for concern
that warranted a search to be carried out.
504. Of this particular prison?
(Mr Murtagh) Yes.
505. And without those specific reasons you
would not recommend that such a search take place, would you?
(Mr Murtagh) We would not have considered that.
506. Can I take you to the last page of this
document? You say here, "I have no information on the situation
that currently exists at the other two main resettlement sites,
Latchmere House and Kirklevington Grange, but the outcome of this
operation must point to a need to subject both of those establishments
to similar scrutiny."
(Mr Murtagh) Yes.
507. So, without any detailed information whatsoever
in respect of those two establishments you say that they must
need similar searches?
(Mr Murtagh) No, that is not what I said. I was drawing
attention to the fact that I had identified particular weaknesses
in terms of the security of the establishment and that I was recommending
and suggesting that the area managers of the other establishments
should look closely at the procedures in operation.
508. This is to the Director General?
(Mr Murtagh) Yes.
509. You confirm here that you have no information
on the situation at Latchmere or Kirklevington.
(Mr Murtagh) That is correct.
510. Without that information you nonetheless
told him that the outcome of this particular operation must point
to the need to subject both of those establishments to similar
scrutiny?
(Mr Murtagh) Yes, but scrutiny is not search. It is
a close look at what is happening at those establishments, which
actually did happen I believe.
511. That suggestion that there is a necessity
to subject both those establishments to similar scrutiny is irrespective
of any understanding or evidence about either of those institutions
or establishments? It is not conditional upon any information
at all. You say you do not know any information about those establishments?
(Mr Murtagh) That is correct. I make that clear.
512. I am obliged. It is therefore not reliant
upon any information about them or intelligence about those establishments
whatsoever?
(Mr Murtagh) That is correct.
513. It is not reliant upon any information
about the Governor?
(Mr Murtagh) My statement that is here—
514. Of either of those establishments?
(Mr Murtagh) My statement that is here is stating
that it might be appropriate in the light of what we have found
here to look at the procedures that are in existence in the other
two resettlement establishments.
515. For reasons completely unrelated to any
intelligence about those establishments?
(Mr Murtagh) I was not advocating any search of those
establishments.
516. I just wonder then what is the similarity
between those two establishments and this one? There is no intelligence
about them that you had. The only thing that joins them is that
they are both resettlement prisons, that is right, is it not?
(Mr Murtagh) That is right.
517. That is the only thing that joins them?
Your evidence is that this search points to the necessity for
all resettlement prisons to undergo similar scrutiny?
(Mr Narey) Can I help?
518. I am asking the author of this particular
document who made the recommendation. It must follow, must it
not, that you are advocating that all resettlement establishments
be subject to similar scrutiny irrespective of any evidence or
intelligence information about them?
(Mr Murtagh) Regarding security procedures, yes, which
is different from searching. That is not what I am advocating.
519. The outcome upon which that conclusion
is based is that which is set out here, the findings at Blantyre
House following that particular search?
(Mr Murtagh) Yes.
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