§ The SOLICITOR - GENERAL (Sir Donald Somervell)I beg to move, in page 3, line 36, to lave out Sub-section (3), and to insert:
(3) In an action brought under the Fatal Accidents Acts, 1846 to 1908, damages may be awarded in respect of the funeral expenses of the deceased person if such expenses have been incurred by the parties for whose benefit the action is brought.This is a drafting Amendment. The Bill provides that funeral expenses may be recovered under Lord Campbell's Act. It is suggested by the hon. and gallant Member for Uxbridge (Lieut.-Colonel Llewellin) that the words which appear in the Bill might possibly be misconstrued, and we therefore propose to insert these words, which, I think, meet the point he raised and are more happily framed than those in the Bill.
§ Major MILNERI think the Amendment is an improvement to the Bill. As I understand it, it makes it perfectly clear that the point on which some discussion took place on Second Reading is covered. That point was with regard to the question whether the parents of a child who was killed, for example, in a motor car accident could recover funeral expenses. At the present time the law is that such expenses cannot be recovered. Hon. Members will have known of cases of very great hardship 1409 where poor people have lost their young children, and because there is no provision in the law enabling funeral expenses to be recovered in case of negligence those parents, who could ill afford it, have had to pay the funeral expenses or the child has had to be buried at the public expense. I understand that the Solicitor-General has satisfied himself that the defect in the present law will be covered by this Bill and that the Amendment will make that fact clear.
§ Amendment agreed to.