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Coroners’ System and Death Certification

I absolutely agree with that point, which links well with my final point. Again, the right hon. and learned Lady has been assiduous in trying to ensure that our courts have user-friendly services, particularly for people who are the subject of domestic violence. In our borough, the service in Camberwell is a great improvement on what it used to be. Coroners’ courts need to have user-friendly services. People on different sides of the case—the person who drove the car that knocked somebody down who died and the family of the victim, for instance—should not have to sit next to one another in the waiting room of any coroner’s court. Refreshment facilities and facilities so that people can go out for a smoke break or whatever are also needed. Our court in Southwark has been modified and is much better than it was, but in some places that has not been the case. In those places, people need the ability to complain if something does not work. To end where I began, the reason why I support a national system is that the public pay for coroners’ courts, so there must be somebody who can receive complaints about a court not delivering a service that is comfortable for the public to use and who can say, ““I’m sorry, but this person””—this court officer or coroner’s officer—““is not up to the job””. This is an important debate about an important service. We have taken a long time to get it right. I hope that lots of work will be done in the coming weeks and months, so that we can agree a way forward that will allow a Bill to be introduced in the new Session. However, I am clear that we should have a Government legal service system, not a local authority system, and that it should receive the funding. That will require Ministers to go into bat for the funding from the current Chancellor—and if he moves on, his successor—to ensure that we have the coroner service that we deserve.