Coroners (Access to Body of Dead Person) Amendment Bill

When the House was debating this last, Jan Tinetti had the call. She has three minutes to speak, should she so wish. That was one of the split calls, so I call Dan Bidois.

It’s a pleasure today to speak at the third reading of the Coroners (Access to Body of Dead Person) Amendment Bill. Now, I know that speaking about death can be a bit sombre for some, but it’s actually a really important topic for us to consider today. And I just want to acknowledge the Māori Affairs Committee—not only the current Māori Affairs Committee but the select committee from the previous—the 51st—Parliament, which originally considered the recommendations which led us to the bill in the House today.

The bill that we’re considering is pretty simple. It requires the coroner to consider tikanga Māori and the expectations of other cultures when determining whether someone can remain with a dead person. Really, it’s about cultural considerations.

It’s a pretty small bill. I mean, as we can see here it’s only about a couple of pages long. But it’s actually a really important change that we’re considering to be making here today. What we’re talking about is, essentially, amending section 26 of the Act, which allows and requires the coroner to in fact consider cultural considerations when they’re interacting with a dead person. And the coroner does have that discretion at this moment and often does work with whānau when this is required. But this bill, essentially, enshrines this as a mandate—that the coroner must in fact consider cultural and other religious or ethnic intricacies when referring to whether they can remain with a dead person.

So the impact of this bill is pretty clear. There’s about 31,000 deaths per year in New Zealand, and about 20 percent, or one in five of those, are referred to a coroner, so that’s about 6,000 on average. So the 6,000 that we’re talking about—section 32 of the current Act sets out the criteria that the coroner should have in mind when, for example, considering whether to conduct a post-mortem. And the amendment bill that we’re considering is really about bringing in the ethnic origins or social attitudes or customs or spiritual beliefs in order to give the coroner a bit more intricacy when making that decision that’s required for many different cultures.

And I think for those out there in the public—certainly in Māori culture it’s really important and I can imagine for other cultures it’s important to possibly remain with a dead person for a number of days. And so this bill, essentially, enables the coroner the discretion or the mandate to in fact do that on a case by case basis.

And so the Māori Affairs Committee from the previous Parliament made a number of recommendations to this Parliament. The recommendation that we’re considering in this bill is one of those recommendations, but I thought it would be worthwhile just running through a number of other recommendations that have also been accepted by this Government around developing a code of best practice that balances cultural considerations with the public interest in finding the cause of death.

Other recommendations are around making sure there’s a code of conduct in place.

💬 Simon O'Connor: A what, sorry?

A code of conduct. That’s my honourable colleague the Hon Simon O’Connor just wanting a little bit more information on that matter. So, essentially, this about enshrining that requirement in the law so that the coroner must take into account these ethnic differences when considering whether whānau should have access to and remain with the body of a dead person.

So this bill, in summary, is a pretty simple change to the legislation. It’s about improving our cultural awareness, and the National Party stands very happy to support this bill.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker and, on behalf of the good people of Dunedin South, can I wish you and the House a very happy Christmas and a restful break.

My contribution on the third reading of the Coroners (Access to Body of Dead Person) Amendment Bill is short and sweet. Can I first of all just say that little is huge—little can be huge. I know that that’s a slogan, and it’s a slogan that’s used by Spark for advertising campaigns—which are actually quite good, can I say—but what sits behind that is a sentiment, which is that small things can have big ramifications and be of big import. This particular bill fits into that category, and there’s three short points to make with regards to this establishment of the coronial framework in New Zealand and the regulation—it’s a regulatory bill, really, that regulates whānau access.

Can I say, though, that these points were made—or one of these points was made—by the Minister in his third reading speech; that it’s largely an reaffirmation of existing process, which I think is quite important, because what it tells us is that the system is actually working. But the fact is—and this goes to the second point—that reaffirming it in law is essentially taking a cultural practice and giving it significance in law.

So it’s not just acknowledging that this is practice and it’s largely practised by coroners. We’re actually putting it into law, which leads to the third point, which is that this may resonate further than this particular piece of legislation, because it’s an affirmation in law of cultural practice. It’s cultural practice and recognising tikanga Māori, but also it’s of cultural practice more widely, and I think that’s really important.

I want to acknowledge, just quickly, the point that the member Harete Hipango made in her contribution last week, which is that, while it factors in tikanga Māori, it also factors in other cultural requirements, needs, beliefs, values, and systems. And she referred to a Muslim social worker who died unexpectedly and the customs and practices of his people and the confusion and the grief that went with that.

This bill, I think, has huge ramifications—little can be huge—and I commend it to the House.

Thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for the opportunity to take a call on the Coroners (Access to Body of Dead Person) Amendment Bill. I think the member opposite, the Hon Clare Curran, is generally right when she says small things can be huge, but when Kieran McAnulty stood up and gave a 10-second speech before, that wasn’t huge. And I’m pretty sure the people of Wairarapa know that quality is better than what he just delivered there, and that’s why they voted for Alastair Scott.

But back to the bill, which National is supporting here tonight, which is the Coroners (Access to Body of Dead Person) Amendment Bill, which is a small bill which deals with a very important issue in regards to addressing the need for cultural requirements to be taken into account by coroners when deciding whether someone should be able to stay with a dead person who may be requiring an autopsy or going through something else which is being done at that time where there’s a question over the death of that person.

That is something which happens in a large number of cases, where people do pass away and the coroner is required to intervene and undertake a post-mortem. Under section 32 and section 37 of the Coroners Act, it already requires the coroner to take into account social attitudes or customs or spiritual beliefs when deciding the criteria for a decision whether to direct a post-mortem, and also when deciding whether a post-mortem may be performed early in some cases, and that’s when a post-mortem may be required to be taking place very quickly. This is putting into law the requirement that when making the decision over whether someone should be able to stay with the body at that time, part of that criteria should be the cultural requirements.

There’s a number of other requirements which have to be taken into account already at the time. That is generally around risk to evidence, risk to the security of the body, whether there’s a requirement for staff to be available, risk to visitors, and whether suitable rooms and facilities are available. So those are a number of the requirements which the coroner has to already take into account, and this, essentially, adds an additional requirement that they have to take into account cultural aspects when making that decision.

I think, as a Parliament, it’s very important for us to recognise the different cultural beliefs and faiths that we have in our community and the different ways that they relate to the body of a dead person and the requirements that they put on the process from when that person dies to when they’re either buried or cremated. This is, I think, something which is not just something which we should see as a small technical change to a law—to put into law something which is already taking place—but it is us as Parliament saying that we are going to recognise the different faiths and the different cultural observances which are required and put into law what coroners generally are already doing, which is for coroners to take that into account when making those decisions. And so, while this is something which is only a small piece of legislation, I think it should be celebrated as recognising our freedom of religion in this country and the freedoms that we enjoy, and further embodying that in our legislation as we continue to recognise that in our country.

So the National Party supports this bill. It’s been outlined where it’s come from, through the review with the Māori Affairs Committee, and why the recommendation was put in place. Without any further ado, I commend the bill to the House.

E Te Māngai o Te Whare, tēnā koe, otirā, ngā mema o Te Whare nei, tēnā tātou katoa. I’m pleased to take a call on the Coroners (Access to Body of Dead Person) Amendment Bill in the third and final reading. Can I first acknowledge the hard-working office of the coroners, who do an amazing job right throughout the country. I also want to acknowledge the work of the Māori Affairs Committee in bringing this bill to the House.

Obviously, as member of Parliament for Ikaroa-Rāwhiti, one of the challenges is actually the availability of coronial services in places like the Tai Rāwhiti in some of our remote areas, and that’s definitely an area that I believe the coalition Government is working very hard on. But the bill itself amends, like previous speakers have said, section 26 of the Coroners Act, to take into consideration cultural protocols. Yes, tikanga Māori, but, in my earlier contribution, I hopefully elicit enough explanation that when we talk about tikanga Māori, we’re actually saying that that is the premise: whereby we respect other cultures. It’s a way of respecting those that have passed and those that are grieving. As we head into the festive season, one hopes that nobody is put at danger—no family or no individual, particularly in this House—that requires the coroner’s services.

It is a straightforward amendment, but it also acknowledges how far we’ve come in this House when we talk about “lore”: l-o-r-e and “law”: l-a-w. I just want to share with the House that yesterday afternoon we had the launch of Te Arawhiti, which was the Māori-Crown relations portfolio under the Hon Kelvin Davis. One of the key speakers at their launch talked about the bridge—Te Arawhiti means bridge—and the importance that Māori and the Crown, as we move forward, put on the relationship on which this opportunity sits.

I don’t want to go on further, but I absolutely support this bill with this hope that the issue of availability of pathologists and coroners in some of our rural communities is also addressed to ensure tikanga Māori under this amendment and under this bill doesn’t just extend coroners’ consideration of immediate families but also to the other cultural considerations of the release of the body in a timely manner so they can be tributed and paid their proper farewell in the process of grieving. So without further ado, I do want to commend this bill to the House and want to also wish, on behalf of Ikaroa-Rāwhiti, a very merry Christmas to you and to all my parliamentary colleagues. Kia ora tātou.

Bill read a third time.