A Delayed Inquest

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22460, 22 July 1938, Page 12

A Delayed Inquest

The statement by the Minister for Railways that any delay in the holding of an inquest on the victim of the railway accident at Aylesbury is "not the fault of the department" shifts any responsibility for the procrastination to a local centre—either the police or the Coroner. The accident, in which an engine fireman lost his life, occurred on March 30, at a period when the public of New Zealand was perturbed, as was also the Minister, about the epidemic of train derailments and mishaps of varying severity and consequences. There can be no justification for the delay in not concluding the coronial inquest, at which all the circumstances leading up to the derailment would be examined. The suspicion that the department might be anxious to defer any public inquiry until the report of the Commission of Inquiry into the Ratana disaster was published is removed by the Ministerial statement. Recently, "The Press" reported that the police had compiled all the evidence which would be tendered at the inquest. With the Railway and Police Departments exonerated, by their own statements, on any charge of dilatoriness, the public has to look to a higher place for responsibility for the delay in allowing it to have the truth of the accident—whether it was caused by the human or mechanical element, whether or not there was negligence or error or omission of a reasonable act. The lapse of four months before a date is announced for holding the inquest suggests that the routine fo.r conducting coronial inquiries in Christchurch is in need of an overhaul. If the magistrates, who also act as coroners, are too busy to devote a day to examining a 'set of circumstances leading to the death of a fireman in an occurrence that agitated the public mind on the question of safety, the appointment of a coroner as in Auckland and Wellington should be seriously considered.,