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Sunday, 22 November 2009
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Government, citizens and rights
Coroners and Death Certification Bill
The purpose of this Bill is to deliver an improved system of death investigation for families, so that they can be assured that the cause of death of their relative has been properly established and that, where possible, lessons can be learned to prevent future deaths.
The main elements of the Bill
The main elements of the Bill are:
- create a new national coroner service, moving towards whole time coroners working to national minimum standards (funding responsibility will remain with local authorities)
- create a new system of secondary certification of deaths that are not referred to the coroner, covering both burials and cremations
- establish a new group of medical examiners to scrutinise independently the causes of death given by doctors on death certificates
- introduce new powers of investigation for coroners, including improved procedures for post mortems and inquests
- establish a new Chief Coroner as head of the coroner service, improve arrangements for coroner appointments and training, and provide for independent inspection of coroners
- create new flexible boundaries between coroner areas to enable services to be delivered to families more effectively, and with powers for the Chief Coroner to reallocate work to prevent backlogs of work developing
- establish new and accessible rights of appeal for bereaved people against coroners’ decisions
- introduce a Charter for the Bereaved outlining a full range of rights for bereaved people to be informed and consulted about case progress by coroners
Additional links
Draft Legislative Programme
The public consultation on proposals for new laws has ended - the Government will now be considering the responses received
