The Coroners Act 1988 specifies who can be legally represented at an inquest. This includes family members and specifies which family members are automatically considered properly interested persons. This representation can be done either by a solicitor or a barrister. If you want to be represented by a barrister, they have to be instructed by a solicitor on your behalf.
Should I contact a solicitor?
If you are concerned about the circumstances of the death then you should consider seeing a solicitor who has specialist experience as soon as possible (see the question below about funding for legal advice). Whilst you might have been told by the coroner, coroner’s officer or other professionals that it is not necessary, we would strongly advise you to talk to one of the organisations listed in the guide about legal advice if you are worried about what has happened. It is not always necessary to have a solicitor but if you want to be legally represented at the inquest itself it is important to have specialist help. It can also help to have a solicitor to assist you in obtaining any paperwork related to your relative’s death or the circumstances surrounding the death. If you are not sure if you have found the right solicitor, you must feel free to ask them questions about their experience and how much they know about the different processes.
There are some circumstances of death where we would strongly recommend contacting a specialist solicitor as soon as possible. Where someone dies whilst in the care of an institution (e.g. psychiatric hospital, prison) or following contact with those working for a public authority (e.g. police) it is advisable to seek specialist legal advice immediately (see Section 3).
How can I find a solicitor?
You can find a solicitor by contacting the relevant organisations listed at the back of the guide. They may be able to suggest someone who has some experience in preparing for inquests.
It is important to find a solicitor with experience of inquests or of the circumstances in which your relative died. If you already have a solicitor you trust and have worked with before then you can suggest they contact the organisations listed for more specialist information. The solicitor should have an understanding of the importance of the inquest to you in finding out what happened.
Most solicitors do not have expertise in inquest preparation and some may give you inadequate advice or charge very high fees. Legal funding for inquests is complicated and a solicitor inexperienced in this work may not know how to help you get the limited funding that may be available.
What will my solicitor do before the inquest?
This depends on the nature of the death but in all cases the solicitor should inform the coroner that they are acting for you and that you are a properly interested person or wish to be recognised as such at the inquest.
Your solicitor should:
- • be in regular contact with the coroner;
• obtain the medical records of the deceased and police reports if available;
• take statements from you and any other key witnesses;
• consider the use of an expert;
• arrange representation at the inquest itself;
• advise you on what the verdict means.
The statement you give to your solicitor should not only deal with the circumstances surrounding the death in considerable detail, but also set out clearly your concerns so that the coroner is in a position to consider them. You should also inform the solicitor of any other information that could be relevant.
If there is a formal investigation, for example by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) or Prisons and Probation Ombudsman (PPO) (see Section 5), your solicitor will liaise with the investigator responsible, help you to ensure any concerns or questions you have are covered in the investigation, and help you to put together any comments on the draft report. It is essential for your solicitor to keep in regular contact with the coroner’s officer to keep your solicitor informed about the arrangements for the inquest including the date, venue, order in which the witnesses will be called and the nature of any exhibits to be presented in evidence.
How can I help the solicitor?
If there are several of you in your family it is useful for one of you to be the main person to work with the solicitor. You should write down as much of what you remember being told about your relative’s death as soon as you can and any background information that you feel might be helpful and relevant to your solicitor’s understanding of your relative and the circumstances of the death. It may be difficult because you will be experiencing shock and distress about the death but it is helpful to do this as soon as you feel able and give it to your solicitor. Requests can then be made to the coroner via the coroner’s officer to call evidence that the family believe is relevant to the cause of death.
Do I need a barrister to represent me at the inquest?
A solicitor or a barrister can represent you at the inquest and ask questions of the witnesses on your behalf. Some solicitors have considerable skill and experience of representing people at hearings and some do not. Not all solicitors represent people in court, but this does not mean that they are any less capable at what they do in advising you. Usually the solicitor will instruct a barrister to represent you in the court itself. It is best to discuss this with your solicitor and any of the organisations listed in this guide you have been in contact with. This is particularly relevant when there are lawyers acting for other properly interested persons and who will be representing them at the inquest.
If I have a barrister will I meet them before the inquest?
It is best practice for you and your solicitor to have a meeting (called a conference in legal jargon) with your barrister before the inquest. You may also meet them if there is a pre-inquest hearing (see Section 4).
It is important that you let your barrister know what your concerns are and what questions you want to be asked. It is a good idea to write down any points that you want to raise with them before the meeting. You may be anxious that one or two meetings will not be long enough for them to understand your case but they will have read the papers produced by the solicitor very carefully. What is important to remember is that you are instructing them and they are there to ask questions at the inquest on your behalf and so you should not be shy about raising particular points with them.
They will be able to advise you on whether these points can be raised through questions at the inquest. If they tell you that some of the things you are concerned about cannot be put to witnesses at the inquest it may be because of the law related to inquests that only allows quite a narrow look at the circumstances surrounding the death. You should feel free to ask your solicitor and barrister to explain why they don’t think some of your concerns can be raised at the inquest. The best time to do that is in conferences before the hearing rather than while it is taking place.
How much does it cost?
Unfortunately, there is no automatic public funding for a family’s legal costs at an inquest and what help you get depends on your circumstances and the particular nature of the death. In some circumstances and where your income is below a certain amount, you should be eligible for Legal Help. This pays for a solicitor’s initial advice and most of the preparation that is necessary before an inquest. There is no routine financial help for representation – which is when your barrister or solicitor attends the actual inquest hearing to speak on your behalf.
There are some circumstances when this representation will be paid for by the state – this is called Exceptional Funding. If the deceased had a dependent child under the age of 18 or any other dependant or spouse, there is the possibility in some circumstances of taking further legal action, which may include different forms of compensation. In those cases public funding may be available for some of the preparation for the inquest which would have been necessary in any event for the other legal action. Sometimes it is possible to fund your legal representation through Legal Expenses Insurance or a Conditional Fee Agreement (also known as “no win, no fee”). You will need to ask the solicitor to explain the legal costs very carefully to you.
If you are in any doubt about what the solicitor tells you about how to fund your case, get a second opinion or speak to one of the organisations listed in this guide. Sometimes when families are not eligible for legal representation, these organisations may be able to find experienced solicitors and barristers who, depending on the circumstances, may be prepared to charge a low fee or in some cases act for you for free.
What is exceptional funding?
Since April 2000 the Lord Chancellor has had the power to grant legal funding for representation by a solicitor or barrister at the inquest in circumstances the Lord Chancellor believes to be exceptional and where the bereaved people are on a low income.
In cases where someone has died in prison or in police custody or following police contact, or whilst being compulsorily detained under the Mental Health Act, funding is available in principle. But the funding is still dependent on you and your family’s financial circumstances and you may be asked to make a contribution to the costs. The decision is made on a case by case basis and you should suggest to your solicitor that they discuss this with INQUEST if they are considering an application and are not familiar with the process.
You need to be aware that the process of applying for funding is complex and the forms that you will need to fill in for your solicitor to make the application to the Legal Services Commission are very detailed and have been experienced as intrusive by families. In order to means test you to decide whether you are eligible for public funding, you will be asked to give very detailed information about your family’s financial affairs. In some cases coroners may be willing to write a letter in support of a funding application.
