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Burial Law Reform

I agree with the hon. Gentleman. Later in my remarks, he will hear that I have had discussions with local farmers and they are offering their land. The district council should accept the offer and move with it immediately. Although local authorities do not have an obligation, I would strongly argue that it is morally indefensible for West Lancashire district council not to give people the means to bury their loved ones within a reasonable distance of their homes, rather than 20 or 30 miles away. The council has previously granted planning permission for a private company to provide a crematorium and identified an area in which to site a cemetery. However, there has been no action and no progress on that development. That is a really sad indictment of the council. In trying to find a solution, and as a member of the all-party group on funerals and bereavement, I have had discussions with many people, including landowners and private companies. They are interested in providing the land for the development of a cemetery or a crematorium. There is a real opportunity to produce a solution in the coming months in West Lancashire, and it is imperative that the local authority act to resolve the problem now; it needs to resolve it now. As I have said, I have worked closely on the issue with members of the local clergy across all the denominations and I have heard many heartbreaking stories. I have heard of cases of families not being able to bury their loved ones as they would wish, and of families who, to secure any burial plot at all, have had to go to Liverpool, St. Helens or Sefton. That places a significant financial and emotional burden on families at a very difficult time. Some families face an even more horrendous situation because they cannot find, or indeed afford, a plot. One family were told that they could have a 10-year plot in an adjacent borough. For others, cremation is forced upon them against their religious beliefs—but even then there is nowhere suitable in West Lancashire to scatter the ashes. There are many instances of people keeping ashes at home or burying them in the back garden, and I have been shown urns containing ashes of members of the family in the sideboards of homes in Skelmersdale. That is dreadful and a sad reflection of the council’s attitude to the plight of its residents. A burial plot, if it were available in West Lancashire, would cost a resident £440, but one in nearby Liverpool could cost £1,422. That is double what Liverpool residents pay, and £982 more than another West Lancashire resident who already had access to a grave would pay. Burying a person in Sefton would cost £1,002, which is an extra £562. West Lancashire does not have its own crematorium either. The irony is that nearby Sefton has two sites, one of which is actually located within the boundaries of the West Lancashire area. However, only last year did Sefton revise its cremation fees policy so that residents in West Lancashire did not have to pay increased fees. For cremations, Liverpool charges £844 for a non-resident, which is twice the fee for its own residents, while St. Helens charges non-residents £352 to use its cremation facilities. And after that, there is still the problem of finding a suitable place to scatter the ashes. The Minister will be aware of the practice in most local authorities of non-residents paying a much higher price than local residents, to ensure that there is sufficient provision for the council’s tax-paying residents. The question therefore arises of what will happen if West Lancashire council does nothing and the cemeteries in the adjacent areas can no longer assist. The costs that I have mentioned are only the beginning of the higher costs and the difficulties faced by my constituents. They pay increased costs to the undertakers for funeral services, because they cross local authority boundaries and there are increased distances and more time taken. There are also transport difficulties in West Lancashire, and there is no real community transport. If families do not have a car or want to use public transport to visit the distant resting place of their loved ones, they need to negotiate a public transport system that fails them. Often there are no buses to take people to cemeteries and crematoriums outside the area. That is a problem throughout my constituency and a major problem in Skelmersdale, the town with the lowest car ownership levels in the constituency and high levels of poverty and deprivation. To get from Skelmersdale to St. Helens is a 15-mile journey that can take one and a half hours, because there is no rail service in Skelmersdale. My constituents are obliged to take a bus to Wigan, a train to St. Helens and then the No. 358 bus to the cemetery. That is a round trip of nearly three hours. Travelling from Burscough to Anfield in Liverpool involves another three-hour round trip that also requires three changes of transport: a bus from Burscough to Ormskirk, a train to Aintree, and then another bus to the cemetery. Surely nobody can believe that that is acceptable. West Lancashire district council can and should make a decision now, especially as the most suitable land is ready and waiting and the providers are anxious to help. The council must provide a cemetery or refund the extra costs being borne by individuals and families in West Lancashire who have suffered a bereavement. Those local residents need to be repaid. The Human Rights Act 1998 gives a right to life, but as a local Catholic priest said to me:"““It seems that even in death some are more equal than others in our society. Surely it is a basic human right that one’s passing be marked with appropriate dignity and respect and that those who grieve be supported and comforted in a caring and humane fashion.””" A local councillor told me that in West Lancashire it is easier to bury hazardous waste than a loved one. It is time for the council to step up to the plate and make a decision. It should provide a cemetery or meet the increased costs paid by local residents. Section 2 of the Local Government Act 2000, which deals with the promotion of well-being, would allow those payments to be made. The councillors who are involved in not taking a decision—the right decision—should examine their consciences. Members will not be surprised to know that there are those who believe that the memory of Dick Turpin is alive and well in West Lancashire district council, whose motto appears to be ““Your money and your life.””