Down to earth
An innovative Quaker Social Action project has just received a prestigious Guardian Charity Award. Judith Moran explains:
Losing someone you love is desperately sad. Just getting through those first days and weeks – while numb, bereft and steeped in grief and with so many things to sort out – can be overwhelming. The funeral looms and decisions need to be made. Each has a significant financial implication.
This would be challenging for anyone; but for someone who was already struggling to make ends meet the cost of a funeral adds serious and enduring financial hardship to the burden of loss and can leave them with a legacy of debt.
In February 2008 I wrote in the Friend about the cost of dying. I concluded by saying:
So, what exactly are we going to do around death? We want to do something practical but to be very led by the conversations we start opening up with people, rather than assuming we have the answers. Our research has indicated that there are no other charities trying to develop work in this field, in this way, so we remain true to our aim of trying to break new ground, be innovative, be adventurous.
The burden
In September 2010, after two and a half years of discussions, discernment and an awful lot of legwork, Quaker Social Action launched Down to Earth. The project offers free support to recently bereaved people in east London, helping them navigate the maze of decisions required to plan a funeral, negotiate costs and to complete applications to statutory sources of funds. Since Down to Earth opened its doors, we estimate that we’ve helped those who turned to us for support save over £100,000 in funeral costs.
It’s not just about the cost of the funeral. The burden is often more than financial. People’s lives are complex and so our staff and mentors offer a bespoke response to each person’s circumstances.
Tony Piper has been a volunteer mentor for the last eighteen months. During that time he has supported an array of people in traumatic circumstances:
They warned me on the training course that no two cases would be the same, but I could never have imagined the diverse number of things that I’ve done.
Many people just want help with completing their Social Fund applications and the other paperwork that always needs doing after someone dies. With our training we help people get the benefits and grants they are entitled to and significantly reduce their stress.
But sometimes people need more. I remember a very stoic man whose wife had died. He didn’t want a funeral for her because he thought all funerals were religious. He didn’t have any money but before she died his wife insisted that we contacted and spoke with her friends and the people she worked for, as a cleaner, to raise enough money to create a simple send-off. The hug he gave me afterwards said it all.
Individual response
Every experience is different. Every case presents different challenges and demands an individual response, as Tony explains:
I’ll never forget the young lady whose husband had just died, both of them visiting here, 10,000 miles from home. She didn’t know what to do. I organised and led a simple funeral. Seven mourners stood around the coffin and spoke about the man they knew and paid their respects. I sat down with her and we worked through all the paperwork she needed to take her husband’s ashes home. When everything was arranged, she asked me how she could help people in a similar situation when she returns to London because she wants to ‘pay it forward’.
I’ve worked with a couple of people who were getting ready to die. One gentleman has a lovely flat filled with many beautiful things that were going to end up in a house clearance lorry. I helped him find auctioneers who could sell some of his things, so he could give the money to a young disabled relative. As we sorted through his things we discovered a vase containing the ashes of a friend who had died twelve years ago. There was no paperwork to prove they were his ashes so we couldn’t have them scattered at a crematorium. It was a case I hadn’t expected to take on. However, one sunny afternoon, we arranged a little ceremony and scattered those ashes into the Thames. My client, the gentleman with the lovely flat, was very relieved that we had done this and a few weeks later he too died. He had chosen his own funeral, just as he wanted, to spare his family the distress.
I volunteered, as do most of the volunteers, because of our own experience of bereavement. With those experiences, a little knowledge and a lot of care, we can transform our grief by supporting other people. As we help, so we are helped.
An affordable funeral
Quaker Social Action can only do so much. We would like an affordable funeral readily available for everyone: a dignified send off, without any stigma, with minimum stress and maximum support. Social attitudes continue to affect our sense of what constitutes ‘a good send off’, but beyond breaking the taboo surrounding this silent subject, there are also some real structural changes that can help alleviate the suffering.
Informed by the experience of our service users, we have been raising awareness of the high cost of funerals and pushing for transparent pricing. We have been lobbying for a more efficient statutory safety net and are pulling this together by bringing the discussion, informed by our knowledge of poverty, to those involved in end-of-life care, the funeral industry and anyone else with an interest in this field. We’ve set up a strategic alliance and brought together sixty-five like-minded organisations.
Good news
Down to Earth has dug in and now, two years further down the line, these endeavours are being acknowledged with a Guardian Charity Award.
I was overjoyed at the news of this award. Truly elated. I was on the escalator in the underground, glancing idly at the message on my phone. I squealed loudly and burst out crying. A moment later, as I recovered from the shock, the person in front of me on the escalator smiled and said ‘It must be very good news!’
It is very good news. This award gives us credibility. Convinced that this project was desperately needed and is really helping people, our commitment has not wavered. But it has often felt like we are working here alone. People across the country, but particularly in east London, who struggle on low incomes deserve an affordable and meaningful funeral, and we help them to achieve this.
Because we knew the very real and pressing need people are experiencing, we have always wanted to highlight the cost of funerals and push the issue up the national agenda. We want to ensure that more people than we could ever hope to reach can have better funerals. Winning this award strengthens our argument and helps us to do this.
We are always grateful for the continuing support that Friends have given to this project; financial support, suggesting good people for us to talk to, and, most importantly, offering encouragement and affirmation. We needed it. It kept us going. We were lifted by it and from the bottom of our hearts we want to thank you for it.
Judith is director of Quaker Social Action (QSA).
Further details about Down to Earth can be found on the QSA website www.quakersocialaction.com
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