Following our initial directions hearing at the High Court to apply for a Judicial Review, Napo yesterday attended a disclosure hearing. For quite some time, Napo has been seeking to secure a copy of the Test Gate 4 report but, to date, the Secretary of State had only provided summaries, but not the report itself. Because of this, and as the Secretary of State had provided so little other accompanying documentary evidence with their witness statements an application for specific disclosure was made on behalf of Napo, and yesterday afternoon, the Secretary of State was ordered to provide significant documentary evidence, including - importantly - the Test Gate 4 and Test Gate 5 reports. Whilst not all of our requests were accepted by the Judge a significant proportion were, and the documentation that will be released is highly significant in relation to our case against the Secretary of State.
The documentation which will be provided will be subject to an implied duty of confidentiality until such time that they are referred to in open Court. Napo’s Officers and Officials will not therefore be able to disclose any information regarding specific documents to members.
Whilst we still have a long way to go in our legal challenge which is set to commence on 10th December, this is a significant step for Napo and one we hope will provide a boost to members as they continue to work within the chaos of probation on a day to day basis.
Further news and direct mail outs to members will be issued in due course.
Ian Lawrence - General Secretary - Chris Winters and Yvonne Pattison - Napo Co-Chairs
27th November 2014