Written question asked by Ian Lucas (Labour) on Monday, 26 March 2012, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Monday, 16 April 2012. It was answered by Norman Lamb (Liberal Democrat) on Tuesday, 17 April 2012 on behalf of the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills.

Undertakers: Standards

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills if he will introduce a statutory code to promote good practice in the services offered by funeral directors.

Answer: The Government are committed to reducing regulation, and there are no plans to introduce statutory consumer codes. We believe that voluntary codes such as the Consumer Code Accreditation Scheme (CCAS) currently run by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) provide assurances to consumers about the quality of the service they are buying.On 11 April 2012, the Government published their response to the consultation on Empowering and Protecting Consumers. We are inviting the Trading Standards Institute (TSI) to establish a successor to the Consumer Code Approval Scheme (CCAS) from April 2013 on a self-funding basis. In the meantime, the OFT will continue to maintain the CCAS for existing members and progress well-advanced applications. Discussions with code sponsors are continuing on the development of the new scheme and the TSI will be consulting widely on a mechanism for self-funding.Although there is no existing consumer code for funeral services, both the National Society of Allied & Independent Funeral Directors (SAIF) and the National Association of Funeral Directors (NADF) operate codes of practice. I encourage SAIF and NADF to consider whether to develop a consumer code for their industry, working with the TSI.

Secondary information