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Coroners Act 2006

General provisions

3: Purpose of this Act

You could also call this:

"This law helps find out why people die and tries to stop similar deaths happening again."

Illustration for Coroners Act 2006

The purpose of the Coroners Act 2006 is to help prevent deaths and promote justice. You can think of it like this: the Act helps figure out why someone died suddenly or in special circumstances. It also makes recommendations to stop similar deaths from happening again. The Act does this by identifying which deaths need to be looked into and how they should be reported. It considers the needs of the family and friends of the person who died, as well as what is good for the public, and it replaces the old Coroners Act 1988, which you can find on the Coroners Act 1988 page.

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View the original legislation for this page at https://legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1986/0120/latest/link.aspx?id=DLM377063.

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Topics:
Health and wellbeing > Public healthCrime and justice > Victim support
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2: Commencement, or

"When the Coroners Act 2006 comes into effect"

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4: Coroner's role, or

"The coroner's job is to investigate deaths and find out what happened."

Part 1General provisions

3Purpose of this Act

  1. The purpose of this Act is to help to prevent deaths and to promote justice through—

  2. investigations, and the identification of the causes and circumstances, of sudden or unexplained deaths, or deaths in special circumstances; and
    1. the making of recommendations or comments that, if drawn to public attention, may reduce the chances of further deaths occurring in circumstances similar to those in which the deaths occurred.

      1. To help to achieve its purpose, this Act—

      2. identifies deaths that must be reported to a coroner and the process for reporting and investigating those deaths:
        1. recognises both—
          1. the cultural and spiritual needs of family of, and of others who were in a close relationship to, a person who has died; and
            1. the public good associated with a proper and timely understanding of the causes and circumstances of deaths:
            2. provides for an independent coronial system for investigations of deaths by coroners liaising with other authorities permitted or required by law to investigate those deaths:
              1. repeals and replaces the Coroners Act 1988.

                Notes
                • Section 3(1)(b): replaced, on , by section 4 of the Coroners Amendment Act 2016 (2016 No 29).