1:25pm Friday 30th December 2005
By Caroline Innes
FUNERAL directors have blasted council bosses for increasing the cost of burials by almost £100 from January 1.
Blackburn with Darwen council has been accused of giving funeral bosses just 11 days notice of the price rises, which will also see the average cost of a cremation rise by £40.
Harry Gibbs, Blackburn and Accrington secretary for the National Association of Funeral Directors, accused the council of exploiting its monopoly on burial and cremation sites by enforcing the increases of up to 13.7 per cent.
He said: "The prices are absolutely abysmal.
"If we put our prices up by that amount families would go elsewhere but the council can get away with it because there is no competition.
"Obviously prices do go up but this is just not right. What we have here is a death tax.
"How on earth can the council justify these new prices and think that giving us 11 days notice of them is acceptable?" Coun Andy Kay, executive member for regeneration, said: "The overall increase represents a reasonable recovery of costs the council incurs providing this service and maintaining the cemeteries and crematorium."
Blackburn with Darwen Council owns the four burial sites for the area Pleasington, Blackburn Old, Darwen Old, and Darwen Eastern.
From January 1 the price of a burial will rise from £699 to £795 (13.7 per cent) and the cost of a cremation from £320 to £360 (12.5 per cent). And even though prices in Accrington are cheaper at £287 for a cremation and £727 for a burial and to buy the plot many families want their loved ones to be buried or cremated locally so they can visit their final resting place.
Accrington crematorium's prices will not be changed until after April 1.
And for Muslims, whose religion dictates that bodies are buried within hours of death, Pleasington cemetery is the sole local option as it is the only cemetery which operates on a Sunday.
Salim Mulla, secretary for the Lancashire Council of Mosques, said: "Within the Muslim faith we require to bury the dead as quickly as possible and I think many families will be concerned about any increase in the cost of a burial especially such a large one."
In November Pendle Council's executive committee agreed to freeze prices for burials and cremations for three months after planned price rises caused outrage.
Peter Andrews, from Blackburn Funeral Services, said: "The rate of inflation is only 2.1 per cent so to increase prices by 12.5 per cent is criminal."
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