Council funerals a ‘lottery’, says QSA
‘Some councils may not be meeting their legal duties.’
Quaker Social Action (QSA) has highlighted a ‘postcode lottery for council funerals’ in a new report published last week. Councils have a legal duty to carry out a funeral for someone who dies in their area where no one else is making arrangements. This includes someone who has no next of kin, or people on very low incomes who can’t afford funeral costs.
According to the report, published on 16 July, many councils are not providing sufficient, accessible or accurate information. More than a third (thirty-six) of 102 council websites surveyed across the UK had no information online for the public about council funerals. Of the sixty-six councils that had online information, over a quarter (eighteen) had no contact details for people who need to notify the council of a death needing a council funeral. Less than half (twenty-nine out of sixty-six websites) said whether people can attend council funerals. Meanwhile, only just over a quarter (seventeen websites) clearly stated that cremated remains, or ashes, can be collected.
The report, ‘A patchwork of provision: council funerals across the UK’, also showed that seven in ten of the sixty-six websites contained incorrect or misleading information. This included nearly four in ten councils that appeared to suggest that they could choose burial or cremation against the deceased person’s wishes, said QSA. The researchers said that this was narrowly interpreting legal requirements. Phone call research to fifty-four councils ‘often revealed a maze-like process that bereaved people would have to go through to reach the right department at some councils’, said QSA.
Lindesay Mace, co-manager of QSA’s ‘Down to Earth’ project, which undertook the research, said: ‘This report shows that there is an urgent need for statutory minimum standards for council funerals and the new UK Government, and the Scottish Government and Northern Ireland Executive can and must introduce them… There are also worrying signs that some councils may not be meeting their legal duties around honouring the cremation or burial wishes of the person who died. All of this can cause additional distress to people at an already challenging time.’
The research found ‘encouraging results’ from some councils, including Camden, Doncaster, Kingston, Leicester, Lewisham, Northumberland, Oldham, Rochdale and Southampton. It also suggested that there had been ‘some improvement at some councils’ since QSA’s last report on the subject three years ago. Funded by the Financial Fairness Trust, the report includes a list of recommendations. This is chiefly that the UK Government, Northern Ireland Executive and Scottish Government must introduce statutory minimum standards for council funerals to ensure consistent practice. At the moment there are only voluntary guidelines for England and Wales, and nothing at all in Northern Ireland and Scotland.
QSA’s ‘Down to Earth’ project is a UK-wide funeral costs service.
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