The second major object of the plaintiffs’ criticism was the limited nature of the procedural fairness recommended by the report. The failure to accord the prisoner the right to be present at the deliberations of the Segregation Review Board, either at the initial consideration of the decision to segregate or at subsequent reviews, was regarded as a debilitating flaw in the attempt to establish the legitimacy of the process in the minds of the prisoners affected by it. That flaw was compounded by the failure of the Vantour Report to recommend that the Segregation Review Board be presided over by an independent chairperson. The omission was particularly glaring because the report had recommended that disciplinary hearings be presided over by just such an independent chairperson. The need for an independent presiding officer at disciplinary hearings had been the centre-piece of my own recommendations in a study of the disciplinary process in the penitentiary which was extensively cited by the Vantour Report in its discussion of punitive dissociation.12 I had also recommended that in light of the severe consequences of administrative dissociation and its potential for use in lieu of disciplinary proceedings, it was vital that the authority to dissociate under section 2.30(I)(a) be made subject to the same independent decision process. The Vantour Report gave no reasons for rejecting this recommendation.

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