Coroners and Justice Bill

I would like to speak to Amendment 3 in my name. This stems from the work of the Joint Committee on Human Rights of which I am a member. Before I get to the heart of the amendment, I congratulate the Government on requiring coroners to investigate deaths that have occurred in state detention. This is a positive human-rights move. The purpose of the amendment is to make it clear what state detention is. All we have is the phrase, ""in custody or otherwise in state detention"." That is a good move but it would be better if we could have clarity in the Bill about what state detention means. We have the Explanatory Notes to the Bill, which are very useful and come in a thick tome. They explain the Government’s view that the extension enhances the state’s ability to meet its obligations under Article 2 of the European Convention on Human Rights in relation to a number of cases where the liberty of the subject may have been constrained—for example, where people have died while being detained in a variety of contexts, such as in prisons, by the police, in court cells, in young offender institutions, in secure training centres, in secure accommodation and under mental health or immigration and asylum legislation. Of course, that is welcome in general terms but I think that it would be much better if, rather than the key details being in the Explanatory Notes, they were in the Bill. I am not saying that the amendment includes all the possible instances of where a coroner’s investigation might be necessary. Indeed, the amendment says that the list would "include" the following. Therefore, the list is not comprehensive but it would certainly add clarity to the Bill and I hope that the Government will agree that, rather than hiding this in the Explanatory Notes, it is better to have it in the Bill so that everyone knows exactly what we mean. Having said that, I repeat my welcome for the inclusion of the provision by the Government but I just think that they should go one step further in making it clearer.