16.3 |
Military fatalities and the bereaved
and
multiple deaths where there was a “significant common factor”
indicating that an
inquest
outside of Oxfordshire would be appropriate.
34.
Mr Gardiner
also agreed that there were “significant financial implications”
for his
office, and
advised that he was copying the exchange to Oxfordshire County
Council.
35.
Lieutenant
General Sir Alistair Irwin, the Adjutant General from 2003 to
2005,
described
the role of a Casualty Notification Officer (CNO) for the
Inquiry:
“It is the
hope and expectation that those involved [CNOs] will be from the
unit but
sometimes,
particularly if it was an individual based elsewhere, it had to be
done by
somebody
else ... The general principle was that it should be based on the
family
entity, the
military family entity.
“Once the
casualty has been identified beyond peradventure and all the
details
are correct
... the CNO ... has the unenviable task of knocking on the door
and
presenting
the bad news.”26
36.
Vice Admiral
(VAdm) Peter Wilkinson, Deputy Chief of Defence Staff
(Personnel)
(DCDS(Personnel))
from 2007, told the Inquiry:
“... it is
the very first official contact that a bereaved family has with the
MOD or the
Armed
Services that determines how the journey will go from there. If
that official
notification
is carried out appropriately from all sides, then there is a chance
that we
may be able
to help the family as they go through the grieving and
bereavement
process.
If, for whatever reasons, that initial official contact doesn’t go
well, then it is
very hard
to recover. Sometimes we never do.”27
37.
Lt Gen Irwin
described the role of a Visiting Officer (VO) for the
Inquiry:
“... that
person [the CNO] then stays with the family until the notified
casualty Visiting
Officer
appears. The CNO, the one who has broken the bad news, then departs
the
scene and
the VO then remains with the family...
...
“These
people were trained ... to hold the family’s hand through the awful
aftermath
of this.
First of all, the realisation that it has happened, then the
business of going
to the
repatriation ceremonies, then, in many cases, going through the
whole of the
coroner’s
process, then the funerals, and then the gradual trying to piece
together
26
Public
hearing, 21 July 2010, pages 47‑48.
27
Public
hearing, 19 July 2010, page 49.
83