Dr RICHARD WORTH (National) Link to this
This is important legislation by any standard. I stand on behalf of the National Party to make comments in respect of Part 1. In terms of the typical structure adopted by the Parliamentary Counsel Office, this part contains a number of general provisions of an overview nature.
For me, the starting point is certainly the purpose of the Act, which is to help to prevent deaths and, it is stated, to promote justice through the investigation and identification of the causes and circumstances of sudden or unexplained deaths. As was made clear at the second reading, the office of the coroner has a substantial and significant history. In fact, the office of the coroner was established in 1194, with a primary responsibility related to protecting the fiscal position of the Crown. Those are issues that perhaps need not detain us here.
In this part we see not only the purpose of the Act but also the identified role of the coroners, which is set out in clause 4. The role is not singularly isolated in the way that the purpose of the Act might suggest, because the coroner has a range of roles. These can in part be serially described as: receiving a report of a death from the New Zealand Police; making a judgment by way of decision as to whether to direct a post-mortem and, if one is directed, determining whether to authorise certain people other than the pathologist to attend; issues relating to the release of the body; decisions as to whether to open an inquiry and, if an inquiry is to be conducted, the conduct of the inquiry; and, finally, issues relating to report and recommendation.
It is interesting to see what is happening in other countries—in particular, what is happening in the United Kingdom. In that jurisdiction we are seeing almost parallel provisions to what we see in this legislation—a tightening up in terms of the professionalism required of coroners, which is affirmation, I think, that legal qualifications, which are so much admired these days in the community, are an intrinsic and important part of the process.
That is not to say that this legislation is not to be criticised. It represents the best efforts of the Government, propped up by a strong Justice and Electoral Committee, which has made a number of changes. Indeed, there are more changes; sadly, as is so often the case, we see here at the last moment a raft of changes because the Minister in the chair, the Hon Rick Barker, who is with us tonight, has detected a number of errors that his officials have made. I often think it is a pity that the Minister does not carefully review legislation at the outset and pick up the errors that his officials have made. Instead, he apparently prefers to leave it to the end, when with eagle eye he can cast his eye across the bill to determine what he perceives to be appropriate gaps to fill. Certainly, it is the case in respect of Supplementary Order Paper 32 that there are some gaps to fill.
In later opportunities that may be available to talk about the detail of the bill, there are specific aspects that I will seek to target. I indicate in advance that some of the significant issues relating to this legislation quite clearly deal with the circumstance whereby body parts are taken and held for the purposes of investigation. There is a subtlety in the legislation between bodily samples and body parts. I will not deal with that in any greater detail other than to say that, quite clearly, when a corpse has been interred or cremated, it is a sadness for the family, some weeks later, to receive vials of material in the post that contain particular specimens of the deceased. As is so often the case, when the period of grieving is over the family must confront the task of knowing what to do with those vials of extraneous material, be they body samples or body parts. That is an issue that the select committee sought to address, and did.
NICKY WAGNER (National) Link to this
The purpose of this bill is really to provide a framework for coroners as they inquire into sudden or unexplained deaths, so they can establish, as much as possible, the cause or circumstances of those deaths. It is hoped that those investigations in the future can avoid unnecessary deaths. So the purpose of this bill is to try to stop deaths in the future by the knowledge we get from the ones that have happened. The new bill is also to professionalise the coronial system so it can be more consistent, effective, and sensitive to families and cultural needs, because it is particularly important that the public have confidence in this system.
Coroners must perform their work without delay. When listening to the submissions, we heard many people talking about the distress caused by the delay of the coroners’ reports. We feel that the coronial service needs to be able to deliver promptly. One of the main reasons for moving from a part-time coronial service to a full-time professional service is to make sure that the time that it takes is consistent and regular, and that people can rely upon getting the results about their loved one’s death as soon as possible.
Under the bill, there is arrangement for 20 full-time coroners with a legal background. There is also arrangement for a chief coroner, who will take the role of leadership and coordination of those full-time coroners. It is important that they are full-time, because as it is now they tend to have experience of only a few cases. Many work in rural areas and perhaps a case comes up—weekly, monthly—but they have not the experience of the couple of full-time coroners who work in Auckland City. It is hoped, with greater experience and greater expertise, that coroners will be able to perform a more consistent service. That was also something that came out of the submissions—that although in most cases the coroners were respected, and they worked hard at their job, it was very hard to get a consistency right across the country. It believed that with a chief coroner, who will work with the coroners and will issue practice notes, that will get consistent processes and protocols that will help that consistency across the country. It is also believed that with the chief coroner and full-time coroners, there will be more time for education of the public, and that will lead to a more effective and efficient service.
Overall, I think the bill has worked well. I was very interested to note that even the current coroners were happy with the main tenor of the bill and were supporting the fact of full-time coroners, even though some of them may lose their jobs. We will talk about that, because the actual constitutional understanding of their being disestablished was of concern to us on the National side.
One of the things we also came across was the use of justices of the peace. There has been a long tradition of justices of the peace working as temporary coroners, and they are often called upon on weekends and late nights to stand in for the coroner, and I think they enjoyed doing that work and they certainly provided a good service to our society. But I think as time has gone on and as cases have become more complex and there is a heavier workload, the need for full-time coroners who are professional and have set protocols and processes is very timely, indeed.
The other thing of most concern was in terms of how the media reported on suicides, self-inflicted deaths. That is an issue that has been under debate quite widely, both in the papers and on the wires, and I do not think we can really come out with an answer that we all feel comfortable with. Everybody understands the distress a family faces at a time of unexpected death, particularly if it is a case of suicide. Several submitters talked to us about how they felt when their family was involved with a suicide case, and how they felt with the public and how the public would react to them and their families. Research has gone into suicide in terms of whether it should be mentioned in the media. Of course, one of the areas that concerns us is youth suicide.
CHRISTOPHER FINLAYSON (National) Link to this
As my colleagues have said, the National Opposition supports the bill. I will focus on a number of aspects of Part 1, which deals with the preliminary provisions. I will not dwell on the purpose of the Act or the coroner’s role, but I do want to say something about clause 4A, which was inserted by the Justice and Electoral Committee after hearing a number of submissions from people.
Clause 4A provides that coroners must perform their duties without delay, as far as it is consistent with justice and practicable to do so. The members of the committee, in suggesting that the clause be inserted in the bill, were heavily influenced by submissions from various members of the public who had had to wait, on some occasions, for a number of years before the result of a coronial inquiry was released.
Dr Worth has referred to the problems and the stress faced when people die and are buried or cremated and then families find that their bodily parts or vials of substance are referred to them some months later. That is one aspect of the stress. Another aspect is having to deal with coronial inquiries that go on interminably and are never dealt with finally because it takes so long for part-time coroners to deal with particular coronial inquiries. So clause 4A is an extremely important clause, and it will go a long way towards ensuring that all coroners are aware of their obligations to deal with things, as far as justice permits, in as speedy a manner as possible.
In order to give effect to that clause and to the general Act, clause 5 introduces a new concept in New Zealand law—that of the office of chief coroner. Rather than having 50 or 60 part-time coroners doing their own thing around the country—two in Auckland on a full-time basis and the rest spread throughout the country and contributing to various degrees—there will be a chief coroner who will be responsible for overseeing the administration of the coronial system in New Zealand, and in particular for providing leadership and guidance to other coroners to ensure that investigations are done properly, and that they are done quickly. The chief coroner will also be empowered, as clause 5 states, to issue practice notes that will provide detailed guidance to coroners on the way they can discharge their functions. The other key point about the chief coroner is that he or she will be responsible for allocating resources so that coronial inquests can be conducted in the right part of the country at the right time, rather than people having to travel hundreds of miles to an inquest.
So those are the two key innovations in this part of the bill. They are good innovations because the office of chief coroner will become, I am sure, a very important one in the State, and it will ensure that coronial inquiries are conducted properly, that coronial investigations maintain a uniform standard throughout the country, and, importantly, that they are conducted quickly. As I said, one of the worst problems faced by people who have had to deal with the coronial system has been that of delay, but by setting up the regime of chief coroner, and with some of the other aspects of the bill—which I will come to during the debate on later parts—I am sure it will be a good system; one that will be welcomed by the public of New Zealand, and one that will work very well.
Hon RICK BARKER (Minister for Courts) Link to this
I think this is one of those occasions when the New Zealand Parliament, the House of Representatives, will perform to one of its better standards. Very often the public see dispute and disagreement in this Parliament, but this is one of many occasions when we generally agree on what is to be done. This is very good legislation.
I think the first thing we have all agreed on is that the current coronial system is less than satisfactory. I am not casting any particular aspersions on anyone or on any particular aspect of it; it is simply not as good as it could be. We have considered what needs to be done, and I think there is general agreement that we need to professionalise our coronial service. We need to have leadership in our coronial service, and we need to set out in the beginning of the legislation the things that are important to us. Over and over again the same themes keep coming back to me.
The first one, as mentioned by Nicky Wagner and Chris Finlayson, is timeliness. People have constantly made comments about the timeliness or the delays. Mr Finalyson made note of a report that was years overdue. I have had similar circumstances drawn to my attention too, and there has been quite an amount of frustration. The legislation was drafted and sent to the Justice and Electoral Committee. Under clause 5A(b), one of the functions of the chief coroner is “to help ensure coroners’ investigations are conducted in an orderly and expeditious way by overseeing them,”. That was a clear requirement of the chief coroner, but the select committee has decided it wants to make sure people understand exactly what the requirement is, and we have a classic example of belt and braces. In some ways, clause 4A is superfluous. But I agree with it being there because it ensures that this Parliament is making a clear statement that these matters are to be dealt with expeditiously—let there be no doubt about that. That is what Parliament says and we have put it there very clearly on the record.
The second part I want to highlight goes back into clause 3, “Purpose of this Act”, and in particular, clause 3(2)(b)(i). I draw this to the attention of Parliament, and of those who read back over this debate to see what in this legislation was so very important for this Parliament, because, for me, it is one of the most important elements of the bill. It recognises the cultural and spiritual needs of the family and of others who were in a close relationship to a person who has died. We want to make it very clear to the coronial service that this is one of the most important elements in that service. Coroners are to be appreciative of and to understand the cultural and spiritual needs of a family.
I have spoken to coroners in Auckland and I am impressed with the service that they have provided, because they are full-time, professional coroners and the service has been well developed. That, to me, seems to be the minimum standard we should expect in the future. In the Auckland area coroners have understood clearly the spiritual and cultural needs of the families and they take those responsibilities very seriously, as all of us from this Parliament would expect them to do.
I think this is good legislation. It is another good example of where Parliament—most of the time—works very well in progressing good legislation for the betterment and improvement of New Zealand. I look forward to the debate continuing on this legislation. I think it will be very constructive and worthwhile.
Dr JONATHAN COLEMAN (National—Northcote) Link to this
It is a pleasure to be speaking in the Committee stage of the Coroners Bill, and I think that many of my colleagues who spoke before me tonight summed up many of the issues very well. But one thing we need to do in the course of this debate is pay tribute to the men and women who have served as coroners in New Zealand for many years. I know that this bill seeks to put some structure around what we might call the coronial profession, but I think it is fair to say that the country has been very well served by the people who have carried out the coronial function in a very professional manner for decades and decades.
If we look at the people who have been doing this task, we see that they are people from the police force and the legal profession, and, of course, medical practitioners. It behoves us well to recognise their contribution. Many of those people have had other professional obligations. They have served their community well in a number of other capacities. I know that one of the coroners in Auckland has been a consultant obstetrician for many years. He is also a qualified lawyer and a Rhodes scholar. When that quality of person has been serving us in this capacity, we know that New Zealanders have been well served.
But times change and it is important to acknowledge that, and now more considerations have to be accounted for around the coronial process. It is really quite appropriate that this legislation comes forward now, and the appointment of a chief coroner is something that is probably long overdue. New Zealanders need to know that when they are confronted by extremely sensitive circumstances at what, for most people, would be a disastrous stage of their life—when a loved one or close relative is the subject of a coronial inquest—wherever they go in the country there will be a consistency of process. That is what this legislation will provide. There will now be, I believe, 20 full-time coroners who will be supervised by one chief coroner, which means there will be rigorous processes around coronial inquests and that a consistency of service will be offered that takes into account and reflects the needs and expectations of modern New Zealand society. We are a diverse country made up of many different peoples, and we do not all have the same beliefs and processes.