Clause 22
Coroners and Justice Bill
6:30 pm
Brian Iddon (Bolton South East, Labour)
I have two simple questions for my hon. Friend the Minister, the first of which concerns the employment rights of coroners. For 10 years I campaigned to change the status of registration officers. They were statutory officers, which meant that they had no formal employer and no formal right to go through any employment legislation, including employment tribunals, if they were considered to be unfairly dismissed.
During many debates in which I tried to convert registration officers so that they would be covered under employment laws—that came about in the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007—I learned that coroners were almost certainly statutory officers as well. Are they statutory officers? As such, do they have any rights under the various employment Acts? My second question concerns indemnity for coroners when, for example, their verdicts are challenged by a judicial review. Are they indemnified?