Question

To ask the Member for Battersea, representing the Church Commissioners, what assessment the Church Commissioners have made of the potential impact of the Law Commission's consultation on burial and cremation, published on 3 October 2024, on the finances of local authorities taking over the maintenance of closed churchyards.

The National Institutions of the Church of England submitted a response to the Law Commission’s consultation on burial and cremation. That response supported the introduction of a statutory code of practice for local authorities’ maintenance of burial grounds, including closed churchyards.

It also agreed with the Law Commission’s proposal that the Secretary of State should have the power to reopen closed burial grounds and that where a churchyard is reopened, the local authority should continue to have responsibility for its maintenance.

Local authority finance itself is not an area within the remit of the Church of England.