Name: Constitution Committee
Uploaded: 2026-11-04T10:30:00+00:00
Duration: 8715 s
Description: Subject: The UK’s constitutional safeguards Witness(es): Sir Brian Langstaff, former senior judge, president of the Employment Appeal Tribunal and chair, Infected Blood Inquiry; Sir John Saunders, former senior judge and chair, Manchester Arena Inquiry Witness(es): Daniel Greenberg, Parliamentary Commissioner, Standards

15:31 - 17:09

Speaker 1

Good morning and welcome to this meeting of the House of Lords Constitution Committee. Today, we are continuing to take evidence for the committee's inquiry into the UK constitutional safeguards. Later on, we will be joined by Daniel Greenberg, Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards, but before that, we are delighted to be joined by Sir Brian Langstaff, former chair of the Infected Blood Inquiry, and Sir John Saunders, former chair of the Manchester Arena Inquiry.

We will be inviting you to reflect on your extensive experience, both of public inquiries and as senior members of the judiciary. You are both very welcome. Now, my lords, I welcome I remind members to declare any interests relevant to this inquiry or today's meeting the first time they speak. I have no relevant interests of my own to declare. So, I will go into the first question.

Public inquiries, they are much in the news on a whole range of areas. Although it's a bit of a wide question, it might allow you if you wanted to make a initial statement, is in your view do public inquiries play a substantial constitutional role in the way we run ourselves as a democratically rooted country?

17:09 - 17:32

Speaker 2

I think the clear answer for me to that is yes. It has to be recognized that the principal body which brings government, the executive, to account is Parliament. But Parliament does its work necessarily through committees, through debates, through questions.

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