Draft legislation that gives coroners greater powers will be discussed at Cabinet prior to its publication in the coming weeks.
The Coroner's Bill is at "an advanced stage of drafting" and will be put before the Cabinet "as soon as possible," according to a spokeswoman at the Department of Justice.
The Bill proposes to widen the scope of an inquest from investigating the proximate medical cause of death to establishing the circumstances in which the person died.
Under current law, the 1962 Coroner's Act, inquests are restricted to an examination of "how" a person died. In 2000, the Coroners Review Group recommended the extension of the remit of the coroner to the investigation of the wider circumstances surrounding a death.
At early stages of its drafting in 2005, Minister for Justice Michael McDowell said the proposed Bill incorporates "many of the recommendations made by the Coroners Review Group".
He added: "This piece of legislation will radically overhaul and reform the coroner service. It will provide for a modernisation of the death investigation, post-mortem and inquest procedures so as to ensure a better service to society in general, and to the relatives of the deceased."
There are 48 coroners court districts throughout the State. An inquest into a person's death is held at a coroner's court if someone dies in unnatural circumstances. The coroner must determine the who, what, when, where and how that life came to an end. Questions of civil or criminal liability cannot be considered or investigated and no person can be exonerated.
All coroners are either a lawyer or doctor appointed by local authorities. All are part-time State officials, except Dublin city coroner Dr Brian Farrell, whose position is full-time.
A rift between Mr McDowell and the Coroners Society of Ireland over the proposed Bill in January appears to have been resolved.
The president of the society, West Galway coroner Dr Ciarán McLoughlin, said they were no longer seeking legal advice concerning wording in the Bill that said some coroners would "cease to hold office" on the establishment date of the Bill. At the time, Dr McLoughlin said, this issue was of major concern as there had been no consultation on it.
But since January, negotiations between the coroners society and the department had taken place and "slight amendments" were made to the Bill. These had "addressed all our concerns", Dr McLoughlin said.
Dr McLoughlin and the department declined to say whether the draft legislation still proposes to reduce significantly the number of coroners by introducing full-time positions to replace part-time posts.
The legislation proposes to give coroners search powers and jurisdiction to impound documents. It will also end the mandatory use of juries into deaths resulting from road collisions.