The Dispossessed: Breakthrough for our drive to end baby burial shame

Intolerable: last week we reported how a fox had taken a baby’s corpse
12 April 2012

The Evening Standard's campaign to end the scandal of children being buried in mass graves took a major step forward today when a key borough vowed to end the practice.

Southwark, which last year buried 72 babies in "paupers' graves" — more than any other London council — has promised to ensure they are laid to rest with dignity.

It becomes the 13th of the capital's local authorities to sign up to the Standard's charter calling for an end to Dickensian-style mass graves. Last week it emerged that a fox had been able to take a baby from a paupers' grave in Battersea New Cemetery because it was not properly sealed.

Southwark's decision means families too poor to afford a burial will no longer have to see their children placed in a pit containing up to 30 bodies — the most buried together in any London borough. It also brings to an end a hidden practice that has gone on for hundreds of years.

Graves will no longer be left with planks placed loosely on top, leaving bodies accessible to scavenging animals. Most importantly, parents will have a choice of cremation or burial site.

Paul Kyriacou, Southwark's executive member for the environment, said: "Following the Standard's exposé we have looked again at this practice. We have decided every parent should have the choice not to bury their child in a communal grave. We believe everyone deserves a dignified burial service.

"We face the challenge of having two major hospitals nearby and very limited space at our cemeteries, but this is too important an issue to ignore."

Last week Mr Kyriacou had cited "tight budget constraints" as an excuse for failing to offer individual graves.

The boroughs responsible for 45 per cent of London's communal child and baby burials have now signed up to the charter. Wandsworth, which runs the cemetery where the fox seized the child, is one of them.

London's most affluent borough, Kensington and Chelsea, has still not signed up. The Conservative authority buries pauper babies 20 to a pit and in the last three years has conducted 16 pauper burials. It would cost the council less than £7,000 a year to adopt our proposals. Eight boroughs say they "need more time to seriously consider" our proposals.

So far, only Conservative-led Merton has confirmed it would not support our charter. Bexley and Greenwich declined to respond to our survey.

Who is adopting our charter?

Boroughs that have adopted our charter: Southwark (72 child/baby pauper burials last year); Wandsworth (37); Hammersmith & Fulham (3); Sutton (1); Ealing, Harrow, Lambeth, Havering, Westminster, Enfield, Croydon, Tower Hamlets, Richmond (0)

Boroughs that "need more time" to "carefully consider" our charter: Islington (33); Barnet (12); Hillingdon (8); Bromley (1); Hounslow, Redbridge, Haringey, Waltham Forest (0)

Boroughs that have yet to give a definitive response: Brent (38); Camden (33); Lewisham (12); Kensington and Chelsea (2); Hackney (1); Barking & Dagenham, Newham, Kingston (0)

Borough that has refused to support our charter: Merton (1)

* Bexley and Greenwich declined to respond to our survey

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