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Coroners and Justice Bill

My Lords, I realise that I am but one of the 43 Members of your Lordships’ House who have indicated their wish to speak on the Coroners and Justice Bill. No doubt, noble Lords will be relieved to know that I do not intend to speak for the allotted eight minutes, but I hope that my few remarks about this catch-all Bill may carry some weight despite their brevity. I shall not touch on some of the more controversial parts of the Bill, which have been or will be adequately covered by other noble Lords, and I shall reserve my judgment about those important sections until the next stage. However, if these measures are intended to reform the coroners’ system as a whole in this country, why do we not bite the bullet and make it a centrally funded national coroners’ service that is overseen by the Lord Chancellor through the Ministry of Justice? That would thereby give power, as well as formal and adequate support, to the new Chief Coroner and subsequently give help and support to bereaved families. If this is not done, I can already hear the arguments regarding the adequacy by the "relevant authority", whomsoever that might be, which, according to Clause 24, ""must secure the provision of whatever officers and other staff are needed by the coroners … to carry out their"," duty. It adds that the, ""relevant authority … must maintain, or secure the maintenance of, accommodation"." My final two short and practical points relate to the requirement that a senior coroner needs authority from the Chief Coroner before he can carry out searches and the fact that, throughout the whole Bill, there seems to be no mention whatever of that most important person in the coroners’ system, the coroner’s officer. He or she is the person whom the coroner would ask, "Make sure you get the suicide note or the pills". Alternatively, to use a hypothetical example of what happens at present, where perhaps an unusual number of deaths have occurred in a nursing home or hospital, and when time is of the essence, the coroner might wish to send his officer post-haste to obtain the hospital operations notes, or copies of them or other material relating to the deceased persons. The nearest coroner to your Lordships’ House is the coroner for Westminster, a man of 30 years’ experience, who is both a medical doctor and a barrister. He has in his time conducted an incredible 12,000 inquests, including those covering the Iranian embassy siege, the "Marchioness" disaster and 10 fatal bombing incidents. Must he and those other equally experienced coroners waste vital time in the future seeking authority from the Chief Coroner for a search, rather than immediately sending the coroner’s officer to gather evidence—dare I say it—before it is destroyed or mishandled? In the Metropolitan Police area, which of course includes the City of Westminster, the coroner’s officer would be a police officer or member of police staff provided from the commissioner’s budget. However, the office in which he works, the paper on which he writes his reports and the chair on which he sits are provided by Westminster City Council. Similarly, in Surrey, the chief constable provides the coroner’s officer from the budget for his agreed establishment of officers and staff, but the premises and all equipment used by the coroner and his staff are paid for by the county council as the relevant authority. There seem to be different and piecemeal systems throughout the 100 or so coroner areas in England. Should not the requirement to provide staff and accommodation be formalised nationally, be dealt with through the Ministry of Justice and centrally funded, as the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Gresford, suggested?