Government climb-down on secret inquests

(London – 15 May 2009) Human rights group Liberty today claimed victory for victims after the Government announced that the secret inquest provisions in the Coroners and Justice bill would be dropped. The controversial proposals have generated widespread concern about the consequences for bereaved families and the negative impact on public trust and confidence.

Shami Chakrabarti, Director of Liberty, said:

"We welcome this sane and humble climb-down by the Lord Chancellor. It was completely bizarre for a Government that has spent over a decade lecturing the public about victims' rights to attempt to exclude bereaved families from open justice.

Secret courts and parallel legal systems have mushroomed under New Labour but as we have learned in recent days there is no accountability without transparency."

Despite last minute amendments, the Government’s proposals would gravely limit transparency and increase executive control over the inquest process and could exclude bereaved families, their legal representatives and the public at large from the investigation process. This could include inquests into highly contentious deaths such as deaths in custody or deaths of individuals where issues of the state’s broader conduct are raised for example an inquest into the death of a soldier killed in Iraq or the inquest into the death of Dr David Kelly.