OVERSEAS TRAVELLERS (ACCIDENTS) (Hansard, 16 April 1973)

§ Mrs. Connie Monks (Chorley)

I welcome this opportunity on the Adjournment to raise issues arising from fatal accidents to three constituents of mine on holiday in Europe. I am asking the Government to instigate an inquiry into ways of helping British citizens who are victims of accidents in Europe, and also their families who grieve at home in Britain.

I do not intend to speak in a critical way because I know that, on the whole, the present arrangements work reasonably well. Nor do I pretend to know all the answers to the problems that I shall pose. The problems, however, are increasing, for growing numbers of inexperienced travellers go across the Channel to holiday upon the Continent. I am asking the Government to reinterpret the instruction inside the cover of our passports, which reads: To afford the bearer such assistance and protection as may be necessary ". That assistance needs to be given in the light of modern life and travel. It also needs to be extended to the families of passport holders. We need to find a way to protect particularly the young who travel about Europe with a confidence engendered by the Welfare State at home —a Welfare State that does not yet exist in Europe. This means that there must be an insistence on adequate insurance— and I repeat, "adequate".

I can illustrate my point by referring to a case that arose in my constituency. A daughter of one of my constituents was killed in a car accident when holidaying in France with her fiancé on 16th July 1972. Her father had—as he thought-seen to it that his daughter was fully covered by insurance before she went, but he had to pay £450 before a move could be made to bring his daughter's body home to England. I had a letter from him on 25th August to the effect that he was not making any headway with the insurance company, and his solicitor had been trying for over a month. The company was insisting on an official death certificate, stating the cause of death, even though the daughter had been killed outright in a car accident and the father had 225 been assured that these certificates were not issued in France.

I quote from my constituent's letter: All the money in the world will never replace our daughter, only time will help towards healing our terrible loss, and until we have a complete settlement from both the insurance company and the French police I am afraid we cannot make a fresh start in life, which is what my wife and I will have to do. He said, in conclusion: I feel there is a case for some higher authority (Ministry level) to sort out this type of plight—which may be of benefit to others in years to come. As a result of my constituent's letter I wrote to the insurance company and the money was paid on 12th October, prior to the court action, which took place on 20th December. If the father had attended the court in France he would have had to pay his own expenses.

My next case is that of Mr. and Mrs. Gasside, of Leyland, who came to see me on 17th March of this year. It was because of their visit that I decided to ask for this Adjournment debate.

Their son Gary, aged 17 had been drowned in Austria on 1st August 1972. They were still waiting seven months later for the final autopsy to learn whether he died from normal drowning or whether he drowned because he had a lung defect as a result of asthma when he was a young child. Certain organs had been removed from the body for the post mortem before cremation, and the ashes were dispatched by air mail parcel post on 11th August addressed to the local undertaker in Preston. However, the parcel did not arrive and it is possible to imagine the parents' concern. As a result, the consular department of the Foreign Office approached the Customs at Manchester airport and the inward parcels section at Canning Town, London. A search was made and the parcel was found on 23rd August, nine days after being dispatched. Even then the Customs officer at Canning Town informed the consular department that a death certificate was required before the parcel could be released and forwarded by post. He had already written to the undertaker in Preston to obtain one. In spite of the plea from the Foreign Office the customs officer would not waive the Home Office regulations governing the importation of human remains. I have never 226 known anything so tragically silly. It was this which caused me to request the debate tonight.

My last example illustrates the language difficulty. Mr. and Mrs. Peters, constituents of mine, went to Spain for a holiday. Mr. Peters was taken ill and died there from natural causes on 1st February 1972. He was buried in Alicante cemetery. Mrs. Peters reimbursed the travel firm for burial expenses at a later date because she had not enough money with her in Spain to meet all her requirements. However, Mrs. Peters did not understand the language and no one explained things to her. She discovered some time later that she had only rented the grave for five years. She was unable to discover what would happen to her husband's body afterwards. She was unable to obtain any information but she believed that it would be put into a communal grave.

Mrs. Peters came to see me and I intervened on her behalf. She paid several hundred pounds more and bought the grave, which is now covered by a flat stone. Mrs. Peters feels that the couriers in charge of these holiday trips should be more conversant with the rules and regulations of the different countries.

All the communications received by Mrs. Peters have been in Spanish. She has had them translated with the help of the local police. The death certificate is in Spanish. Gary Gasside's was in German and the young lady's was in French. Surely it is possible for people dying from accidents like this to have their deaths recorded in this country just as some foreign and Commonwealth probates and letters of administration are recorded here. A British death certificate in the English language could then be issued.

I must also urge that all insurance policies should provide fully comprehensive cover. I know that this is perhaps not a matter for the Government, but a great deal of publicity is needed to make sure that this happens. It is necessary to use words that everybody understands, because so much is often concealed by what is said in the small print.

Insurance really must be compulsory. It is more and more necessary that those who sell "happy holidays" should also include adequate insurance in the price ticket to cover all eventualities in case of tragedy. Customers should look with 227 as much interest on full cover as on sunny beaches advertised in brochures.

There is a need for some kind of special report centre which could liaise with the Departments responsible, such as the Foreign Office, the Home Office and Social Security, so that help and information can be quickly given and where people's inquiries can be made and language problems solved. If we can have a "hot line" to explain price increases, surely we can have something comparable to cope with accidents such as these and to help the people who are very distressed at such times.

Reports on death and all certificates and documents need to be translated into English. I wonder whether this could best be done in the British Embassy in the country where an accident happened, or perhaps at a report centre such as I have suggested. We must have improved communication between the scene of the accident and the family at home. It is not enough for a policeman to call to give the message and then to have several days' silence. Verbal contact must be arranged between those at the scene of the accident and those at home so that questions can be asked and answered.

I cannot expect that all the points I have made will be answered at this late hour by my hon. Friend the Undersecretary but I hope that some of them will be carefully considered.

§ The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr. Anthony Kershaw)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Chorley (Mrs. Monks) for raising these important matters which, as she has said, concern more and more people these days because of the extent of travel, which is growing every year. I very much hope that the debate initiated by my hon. Friend tonight will call attention yet again to the desirability of insurance and to the difficulties which people can encounter if they go abroad without proper preparation.

I shall have a word or two to say about the existing practice, but I should like to refer first to the three cases raised by my hon. Friend from her constituency. As regards Miss Yates, who was so unfortunately killed in a motor crash, it is 228 the case that death certificates in France do not show the cause of death. This, however, is not unique to France but applies in a great many countries. But a hospital or doctor's certificate does, of course, show the cause of death, and if there is any difficulty about obtaining this certificate the consular officers of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office are always at the disposal of people to enable them to obtain it. There should have been no difficulty in getting a death certificate specifying the cause of death of Miss Yates. Had we been asked, we should have been able to get this certificate without any trouble, and so have obviated the difficulty in which the insurance company found itself. I congratulate my hon. Friend on her persistence and good advice which resulted in getting from the insurance company the payment for which it was liable.

In the case of Mr. Gasside, there were delays, but they were explicable. Mr. Gasside's elder brother was with him on holiday and he instructed the German undertaker. But the undertaker was reluctant to release the urn containing the ashes because his account had not been settled. Our Consul in Stuttgart went to see him, and he was persuaded to dispatch the urn on 14th August. It was found to be in the General Post Office in Canning Town on 21st August.

The subsequent delay, over which the Foreign and Commonwealth Office had no control, was due to the legal necessity for the Customs and Excise officer to be satisfied that there was some documentation before he could release the urn. The Home Office has laid down that such ashes or remains cannot be released without a death or cremation certificate. This certificate was in the possession of the undertaker in the place where the family resided. The explanation for the long delay must be that he did not send it promptly.

I am concerned to learn today that the final autopsy report which was asked for by the family has not yet reached them. The history is that on 30th November 1972 a German doctor, Professor Klein, informed our Consul in Stuttgart that he had completed his examination and would send his report direct to Mr. Gasside. The Consular Department of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office 229 heard nothing further, and we had no reason to doubt that Professor Klein had been as good as his word. In the light of what my hon. Friend said, I shall take up the non-arrival of the report with the German authorities and try to get it as soon as possible. I understand the anxiety of the bereaved parents that they still do not know the exact cause of their son's death.

As my hon. Friend said, the distress caused to Mrs. Peters about the cemetery in Alicante is really a matter of language. I cannot understand how she came to believe that her husband's grave could be used only for five years, after which he would have to be removed to a common grave, and that she could not erect a memorial slab. As soon as our Consul in Alicante knew about this he confirmed to her that the gravestone was in place and that the grave could be purchased in perpetuity.

I do not know what can be done to overcome the language difficulty. The different languages spoken in Europe and all over the world must be a barrier to easy communication for travellers, but I do not see how we can ensure that no language difficulties arise.

In cases of accidents to British citizens travelling to Europe and elsewhere our consular offices and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in London are always ready to advise and assist in any way they can, provided that they are told, either by relatives or friends or by local police, that an accident has occurred.

Our consuls are available, and when they hear of an accident in which British people are involved they make sure that the next of kin are advised. But there are certain limits to what can be done. We have not the staff to do the things which relatives may want in these circumstances. These responsibilities properly fall upon the relatives or the tour operators, and they must assume them. Consular officers, for example, are not empowered to advance public funds to conduct searches, perhaps in mountains, or, in the case of drowning, in the sea, to meet hospital expenses or to repatriate human remains. Only in cases of proved destitution can minimal funeral expenses be met.

We try to advise travellers, in the essential information booklet issued with every passport, through the mass media 230 and by all reputable tour operators and travel agents, what the dangers are. We encourage and warn travellers, for example, to take out adequate insurance against illness, injury or death. Of course, sometimes the insurance taken out is quite inadequate for the purpose.

For example, a large number of people I have come across insure themselves for £200 when they are going to the United States. That is ludicrous. It lasts about three days in hospital in the United States or Canada. If someone has a heart attack, for example, and has to stay six weeks in hospital, although the hospitals there try to make arrangements for gradual payment, they are not authorised to give free treatment, because those countries do not have the health services that we have, and it is therefore a heavy burden on people who may be old and not well off, wondering how they are to pay these great bills. It is absolutely necessary for people travelling to countries where there is no reciprocal arrangement with this country to be adequately advised by the tour operators, and, as far as we can do it, by the Foreign Office, to take out adequate insurance.

We realise that in moments of distress relatives may wish things to be done which are beyond our powers. What we can do is to keep available information on costs of local burial, the costs of hiring a lawyer, and the estimated costs, if people want to know in advance, of hos-pitalisation. All this information is at our disposal and we can give it when asked. But we cannot provide against all eventualities and I agree that the need for insurance should be brought very much to the notice of people who wish to travel abroad.

My hon. Friend raised the question of certificates in the English language. It has been possible for many years for deaths of British subjects to be registered on request at British consulates, and thereafter British-style certificates are available on demand. The procedure is laid down by the Registration of Births and Deaths (Consular Officers) Regulations 1948, which provide for British consulates abroad to maintain registers of this nature. Consular death certificates in the English language can then be supplied by the consul, and such registration also ensures that the death is later recorded at the General Register Office in London, 231 or in Edinburgh or in Belfast, as the case may be. These offices will supply copies when required.

Before entering a death in the consular register, the consular officer must be satisfied as to the citizenship of the deceased and must inspect the death certificate issued by the local authorities of the country where the death occurred. There are occasions when, because of the nature of the country, or perhaps lack of administrative expertise, no certificate can be obtained, or it can only be obtained after a long delay. In such cases, the consul is empowered to issue a death certificate after satisfying himself about the facts. But that is an exceptional procedure.

I take the opportunity which my hon. Friend gives me to mention the air crash at Hochwald, in Switzerland, where a large number of people were involved in the type of difficulty to which she has alluded in her three constituency cases. I thank the Swiss people and authorities for their unstinted help and sympathy in the recent disaster. The local villagers, the cantonal and local authorities, the police and rescue teams, the medical and ecclesiastical authorities, and Basle radio station which provided communications during much of the time, laboured magnificently not only at the difficult site of the accident but afterwards in home and hospital to bring help and comfort to the survivors. We are greatly touched that the President of Switzerland will attend a second memorial service at Hochwald today, 17th April.

232 I wish also to draw the attention of the House to the conduct of our own consular staff in Basle, reinforced from Berne and Zurich, who worked unceasingly and with exemplary efficiency.

I am sorry that distress was caused by some confusion about the names of those who had been injured or killed. Passenger lists are the responsibility of airlines, and no doubt this matter will be considered by the official inquiry which our own officials from the Department of Trade and Industry will attend.

I should like again to thank my hon. Friend for bringing to the attention of the public this important subject at this time of the year before the worst holiday rush starts in the summer. I hope that they will take note of what she said about insurance.

I assure my hon. Friend that all our officers are able to do what she wants done in the way of information, in the way of obtaining certificates, and so on. All they need to know is what is wanted. There are some difficulties which cannot be overcome. They cannot help if someone cannot understand the language. But they can help in many other ways. The public can be assured that if they can get to a consulate—and they should have the appropriate addresses with them— they ought to be able to obtain the help which, as my hon. Friend says, is their entitlement.