Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what assessment he has made of the effectiveness of his Department's guidance on the practice of second post-mortems in accounting for recent technological advances.

The Chief Coroner, who is responsible for issuing guidance to coroners, intends to issue revised guidance on the practice of second post-mortems later this year. This will replace existing guidance (Home Office Circular 30/1999 http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20040722015642/http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/docs/hoc9930.html).