Funeral - Burial on Private Land
General Information
Burial in any private land can only take place with the
permission of the landowner. This is true whether you intend to
bury a body or cremated remains.
If you are intending to scatter cremated remains at a
well-loved beauty spot, please remember that the it
will have an owner, e.g. the National Trust, English Heritage,
Government department, or just a private landowner with public
rights of way crossing his/her property. Even the seas
around our coastline are managed by the Environment Agency
and, of course, rivers by the various water authorities.
Some or all of these may have their own stipulations as to where
remains may be scattered or may ban the pratice altogether. Whilst
this may seem distressing and unnecessary when you are suffering
bereavement, there are areas of outstanding natural beauty where
the whole biodiversity may be being changed by the buildup of
scattered remains causing damage to the whole ecosystem of those
areas. (Indeed, a local farmer is concerned for his livestock due
to the change in land he rents from a local landowner brought about
by the very same thing.)
The Environment Agency has good advice on
its website, whilst the Ministry of
Justice goes into more legal detail.
Burial of a body
Some people wish to have their loved ones nearby. You need to
consider quite carefully if you wish to bury / be buried on private
land, because there are consequences. Firstly, the value of the
land or property nearby may drop in price as much as 25-50%. Also
if you have to move later, then you may have to deal emotionally
with the separation. Bodies can be exhumed & moved (the licence
required is free), however, this will almost definitely require
professional help which will have a significant
cost.
You may want a
funeral director to undertake the care of the deceased
and/or burial arrangements for you or you may prefer to
make all
the arrangements yourself. If the latter, it would be
wise to obtain helpful advice from:
The Principal Environmental Health Officer of Bath
and North East Somerset (re the avoidance of making a
statutory nuiscance) 01225 396625.
The Environment Agency (re water tables, etc.) see
above.
The Natural Death
Centre (for comprehensive general advice)
To comply with Environment Agency guidelines,
the burial site must:
- be at least 250 metres away from any well, borehole or spring
that supplies water for human consumption or is to be used in farm
dairies;
- be at least 30 metres from any other spring or water
course
- at least 10 metres from any field drain (draining to a water
course);
- have at least one metre of subsoil below the bottom of the
burial cavity, allowing a hole deep enough for at least one metre
of soil to cover the burial;
- when the burial cavity is first dug, the bottom of the hole
must be free of standing water.
Burial Register
It is advisable to seek legal advice from a solicitor regarding
the creation of a "Burial Register" - a record that can
be kept with the Deeds of the property that indicates
- Who is buried on site
- Where they were buried
- When the person was buried
This is a necessary record, as if the land is sold, some
building work enacted, or a serious land-slip occurs, then the
police and whoever owns the property will need to know about the
site, and if pertinent, adjust their plans.
Memorials
You may wish to erect a memorial to the person
you have buried. As any memorial is considered a building under
national Planning law, you may need to seek planning permission to
have the memorial erected (possibly even for small memorials).
Under some circumstances planning permission may not be required,
but if you are erecting a memorial, you should first contact the
Council's Planning
department for advice:
