highlight our findings and recommendations through the media, in regular meetings with government, and present proposals for strengthening policy and legislation. Secondly, through thematic research and reports, HMI Prisons has been able to focus on specific issues relating to minority groups, including Muslim prisoners. We examined the implementation of the recommendations of an independent inquiry into the racist murder in 2000 of a young prisoner called Zahid Mubarek, which aimed to prevent future racist incidents from occurring in future. Recently, we published a paper that analyses our findings in relation to prisoners identifying as Gypsy, Romany, Traveller. We found that overall, prisons often underestimated their numbers and they are significantly overrepresented in the prison population (around 5%). Higher numbers reported feeling unsafe at some point or had been victimized than non-Gypsy, Romany and Traveller prisoners, as well as higher numbers who had reported victimization when they had experienced it. In general, prisoners who identified as Gypsy, Romany and Traveller were also more likely to report problems in areas of health, including mental health, and substance misuse. However, we found they consistently state they are less likely to receive support in these and other areas. We recommended the government conduct further research to understand their apparent overrepresentation in the criminal justice system, and to understand their needs in prison. Thirdly and finally, monitoring bodies must promote minority rights in the way they conduct themselves. Monitoring bodies are themselves expected to be representative of ethnic and minority groups in the country they work in, and we are conducting work at the moment to strengthen our own workforce diversity in this regard. We have also recently implemented a protocol to ensure no prisoners come to any harm as a result of speaking to us, which is an important element of our own accountability and aims to protect vulnerable prisoners from any sanctions or reprisals. Thank you. Note Official data shows that 26% of the England and Wales prison population was from a minority ethnic group, compared to about one in 10 of the general population. Black prisoners account for the largest number of minority ethnic prisoners (49%) and are 10% of the national prison population (compared to 2.8% of the general population). The number of Muslim prisoners has more than doubled over the past 12 years and figures for 2014 suggest there were over 12,000 Muslims in prison. References and links