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Re Welton Road Cemetery, Daventry

Peterborough Consistory Court: Pittaway Ch, 13 October 2017 [2017] ECC Pet 2 Exhumation – plot reserved for another

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 May 2018

Ruth Arlow*
Affiliation:
Chancellor of the Dioceses of Norwich and Salisbury
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Abstract

Type
Case Notes
Copyright
Copyright © Ecclesiastical Law Society 2018 

The petition was for the exhumation of the cremated remains of Mrs C, which had, as a result of a mistake made by the burial authority, been interred in a plot reserved for Mrs P. The chancellor, having referred to Re Blagdon Cemetery [2002] Fam 299 and the requirement that a faculty for exhumation only exceptionally be granted, and having noted what was said in Blagdon about mistake as to the location of a grave being a ground upon which a faculty for exhumation may be granted, went on to consider the respective degrees of harm which would be caused to the members of the families concerned. The petitioner, Mrs P, had acquired an exclusive right of burial in the plot in question so that her remains could in due course be buried adjacent to those of her parents. Allowing the wrongfully buried cremated remains of Mrs C to remain where they were (followed, as seemed likely, by the subsequent introduction of a memorial there) would be a permanent reminder to Mrs P, when she visited her parents’ grave, that she would in due course have been buried there but for the council's mistake. She would go to her grave in the knowledge that her long-expressed wish to be buried adjacent to her parents had been frustrated. By contrast, the unhappiness of Mrs C's family at the exhumation of her remains would pass with time. Moreover, it would not be beneficial to them to know, when they visited Mrs C's grave, that her remains had been interred there by mistake. Finally, the risk of meeting Mrs P and her family, while they were attending Mrs P's parents’ grave, would be likely to cause distress. A complaint by Mrs P to the Local Government Ombudsman or the bringing of a claim for damages would not be an adequate alternative remedy. Accordingly, Mrs C's remains were to be exhumed within three months and returned to her daughter for re-interment or other disposal elsewhere. The burial authority were ordered to show cause why they should not pay the other parties’ costs. [Alexander McGregor]