Coroners and Justice Bill
10:51 am
Bridget Prentice: I think that one of the first things that the chief coroner might do, although I do not want to pre-empt them, is to look at resources across the country and see what is available and what local authorities are providing. I know that there are examples of coroners who do not have adequate offices or places to conduct an inquest properly. There is a lot of work and discussion to be done to ensure that we raise standards right across the board. I think that we will probably find that some of that can be done without additional finance. With a bit more imagination in the use of public buildings, the quality of accommodation could be improved.
The other thing that the chief coroner will be able to do is to look at exactly how a local authority spends its resource for coroners and give advice on how best to do that. As I have said, with the report to Parliament and the Department, we would have to have discussions with colleagues about whether local authorities were funding the service properly.