Imagine this: when someone dies we don’t hand them over to strangers
When the GFG, in conjunction with the Plunkett Foundation, announced a community funerals initiative back in 2012, we supposed that someone might pick it up and run with it. The Plunkett Foundation, far cleverer than us, was pretty confident they would. They contacted all their community shops and community pubs and we waited with bated breath […]
The only way is ethics
In the Guardian, Niall Booker, head of the Co-op bank, writes: We got ourselves into a mess … That’s why this week we will be asking our customers for their views on our ethical policy and wider values. Refreshing our existing ethical framework and also asking about three new areas – responsible banking, transparency and […]
A promise made is a debt unpaid
The devaluation of the Social Fund Funeral Payment is the main cause of funeral poverty, but there are others. Some families sign up to more than they can afford – and funeral directors let them. The impact on both parties can be devastating. While the great and the good convene conferences to debate solutions, a […]
Should old acquaintance be forgot
There was a time, way back when the world was new and green (remember green?) and a joyous revolution in funerals was imminent. It was a time when scarcely a day passed without the launch of a new online memorial website. The concept ticked all the boxes, floated all the boats, captured the zeitgeist: innovation + […]
All blood runs red
“By all means have memorials. Make them out of Government stone if you like. Make them uniform. But you have no right to employ, in making these memorials, the bodies of other people’s relatives. It is not decent, it is not reasonable, it is not right.” “When the widows and mothers of our dead go […]
Calling all you snappers
The Memorial Awareness Board (MAB) invites you to commemorate the centenary year of the First World War with a national photography competition Launch date is on the 30th May with entries closing on 31st July, with the winner to be announced on 1st September. Now in its fifth year, this critically acclaimed competition calls on […]
A Concerned Priest in South London
On a hot June Sunday morning, David Hall, of Vintage Lorry Funerals, set out at 0600 hours in his 1950 Leyland Beaver for a Monday morning funeral in Walworth, South London. When David was a lad in the 1960’s, Sunday was a sacred day and there would be very little traffic on the road during […]
That was then
“When the place was packed full the undertaker he slid around in his black gloves with his softy soothering ways, putting on the last touches, and getting people and things all ship-shape and comfortable, and making no more sound than a cat. He never spoke; he moved people around, he squeezed in late ones, he […]
Death on the island
The dead of the First World War were tucked up in cemeteries designed and regulated by Those Who Know Best. Edwin Lutyens was one of the architects. Rudyard Kipling was in charge of what was inscribed. The result is, most people agree, fitting and splendid. It was achieved by denying the families of those who […]
Death by chocolate #bovo2014
From the Birmingham Post 25 May 2014: They’re the Oscars you definitely would be seen dead at – and there’s guaranteed to be stiff opposition for a gong. The inaugural Ideal Death Show, a top of the plots for the funeral industry, promises to be a celebration in Birmingham of everything that’s good about slipping […]
