Coroners and Justice Bill

I have been up hill and down dale on this, as I know others have. I thought that clause 12 was a way of resolving this, because it would have placed in the hands of the senior judge the decision as to whether or not to proceed with a certain investigation, they would then have run the investigation and it would have been within the coronial system. That was parodied as a secret inquest, and we have now gone down the route of an inquiry under the Inquiries Act 2005. We have sought to ensure that only a senior judge can sit on this—other clear criteria are set down. This matter has gone round and round for two years now and I am certainly ready to promise the House—Members will have to take it on trust, but there is no reason not to trust me—that the inquiry will be used only in exceptional circumstances. The facts speak for themselves—there is only one extant case in which it is likely to be used, and that is a very rare case. Secondly, I will ensure that my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary and I bring forward a protocol to set out the circumstances in which such an inquiry would take place. They would be very limited, too. It might be useful to deal with amendment (a), tabled by the hon. and learned Member for Beaconsfield (Mr. Grieve), to Lords amendment 128. It suggests that any appointment by the Lord Chancellor of a senior judge should be made with that judge's consent. First, there could and would be no appointment without the consent of the Lord Chief Justice. It is important that I should say that, and it goes without saying that I have to ask the Lord Chief Justice from time to time to nominate a judge; if he or she were to decide that no judge were to be nominated that would be the end of the matter. That power is quite important. The Lord Chief Justice can speak for himself, but I suggest that he would wish to be satisfied about the conditions under which any inquiry were to take place and about what the level of judicial discretion would be for such an inquiry before he made an appointment.