Chronic delays in the coroners’ jurisdiction due to political neglect … Selection committee split over appointment of NSW State Coroner … Experienced hands overlooked … Need for a separate, independent coroners court
Despite the sign out the front of the building in Glebe that says “Coroner’s Court”, NSW is the only state were the Coroner’s Court is not a court at all, it is a part of the NSW magistracy and chief magistrate Judge Graeme Henson wants to keep it that way.
The only coronial appointment that goes to the executive council is that of the State Coroner. The other coroners are selected from among the magistrates by Henson.
The coronial jurisdiction is groaning under a massive workload and chronic delays, with about 6,000 cases a year and only five full-time coroners, including one whose job is shared between two magistrates.
Apart from the full-timers, work is managed on an ad-hoc basis, generally by co-opted magistrates in the bush.
The resources and capacity of NSW magistrates to get on top of the work is now a live issue, even with the $91.5 million Forensic Medicine and Coroner’s Court at Lidcombe which opens next year.
Victoria has 10 full-time coroners and Queensland seven.
The Libcombe facility will have four courtrooms and chambers for six coroners, which does seem to limit the capacity to handle the current caseload, let alone the work 40 years down the track when Sydney’s population will be pretty close to be double what it is now.
According to the accounts that Justinian is hearing, they are needed right now. The current Coroner’s Court at Glebe has two courtrooms and was opened at a time when there were two full-time coroners.
Les Mabbutt, ex-cook, ex-copper and ex-coordinating magistrate at Sydney Central Local Court, has been well-regarded by Judge Henson and other fellow magistrates. He’s a bit of whiz at case management and efficiently runs bail applications and other short matters.
Other magistrates report that in five years at Central he did very few lengthy hearings. He has never conducted an inquest and we’re also told that his appointment has been greeted at Glebe with dismay. His lack of experience means he will will have to be on trainer-wheels, assisted by the experienced full-time coroners.
This is the first occasion that the State Coroner’s position has been advertised. The vacancy became available because Michael Barnes, the outgoing State Coroner, started as the NSW Ombudsman on December 1, 2017.
The selection committee was composed of Henson, Lea Armstrong the crown solicitor, Gary Ulman ex-president of the Law Society, and Arthur Moses from the Bar n’ Grill.
Henson convened the committee in January, after he returned from Europe, and interviews were held in mid-February.
It is understood there were a number of qualified candidates, including the well-regarded acting State Coroner Teresa O’Sullivan, Peter Singleton SC, who has experience running investigations, and retired beak and former deputy State Coroner Hugh Dillon, now an adjunct professor of law at UNSW and the author of works on coronial law and practice.
It is rumoured that the committee was split, with Arthur Moses backing Teresa O’Sullivan for the post.
God knows what happened in cabinet – maybe attorney general Speakman was rolled by police minister Troy-Boy Grant, who was pleased to see a former copper take the job.
The Department of Justice tells us:
“The recruitment process for the State Coroner position was rigorous and merit based.”
The need for a self-standing coroners’ jurisdiction with specialised functions is well-overdue. Successive attorneys general in NSW have been unable or unwilling to get to grips with the issue, while Graeme Henson is still upset that the Children’s Court became a stand-alone jurisdiction, filched from the Local Court.
At the moment the coroners’ jurisdiction plays second fiddle to the Local Court. Both the Law Enforcement Conduct Commission and the NSW Ombudsman have told a parliamentary oversight committee that the coroners desperately need more resources.