Controversial Nottinghamshire grave rules suspended for a year

The leader of Broxtowe Borough Council has told families there will be a 12-month suspension on controversial rules that could have removed tributes from graves. The council caused controversy after a cabinet decision in July this year sought to restrict remembrance items on cemetery plots.

Chilwell Cemetery was the first of five borough-owned cemeteries to receive a deadline of January 23, 2025, for when “unofficial surrounds” would be removed from graves. Items included gravel, vases, glass, windmills and bedding plants – meaning families who created a personal ‘garden’ patch on graves feared having items removed.

The council said restrictions were based on maintenance difficulties and health and safety reasons and rules have always been in place. In response, grieving families created a petition, Save our Cemetery Gardens and Memorials, which started on October 18 and has more than 1,200 signatures.

Families opposed the council’s rules, questioning council leader Milan Radulovic (Lab) after a meeting at Bramcote Crematorium on October 24. That’s where he promised them a “common sense” approach over the controversial rules.

In a private meeting between the council and families today (October 31), Cllr Radulovic has ordered a year-long suspension on the current rules. He told families: “The grieving process in individual, different people respond and react differently, we need to apply some rules with some common sense applied.

“We will suspend any action for a further 12 months to allow a full and proper consultation to take place – you cannot understand a person’s grief.” The arrangement will involve the creation of a working group between families and council officers to come up with a “sensibly-worded solution and policy.”

Cabinet documents from 2009 confirm the current rules have been in place since then. However, the bereavement service only updated its ‘Notice of Interment’ forms in 2023 to note the prohibited items.

Nicola Smith’s son Aaron died in 2018 aged 21, and Lindsey Collins’s 19-year-old son Josh died in 2021. Both sons are buried in the cemetery, and the mums spoke of the “contradiction” in the rules.

Lindsey said: “Why haven’t these rules been enforced? Why, up until recently, haven’t these rules been explicitly explained at the point of purchase? Why haven’t your cemetery staff, managers, and gravediggers challenged anybody regarding things on the lawn area?”

Nicola said later in the meeting: “When I buried him [in 2018], I asked what I was allowed on that grave and I was told that I could have anything if I kept within the measurements and I maintained it myself. I have stuck and adhered to that rule.”

Richard Mott is the strategic and business development manager at Bramcote Bereavement Services. This is the organisation which runs cemeteries and crematoriums across Broxtowe and Erewash, in Derbyshire. He said: “There is no doubt that the environment team have not enforced those rules.

“When you sign your notice of interment, it says on there what you cannot put on there.” He also spoke of how ornaments on plots, when re-opening another grave, inhibit the placement of a soil box and the potential difficulty for people gathering at a separate funeral.

Following the meeting, Cllr Steve Carr (Ind), who represents Beeston North, said: “This [decision] is exactly what I’d hoped for. What the families were looking for was somebody to listen to them, not just now but moving forward.

“They can come up with a solution which is pragmatic and sensible from both points of view- the actual suspending of the new policy is excellent news.” Cllr Radulovic says it will allow a “negotiation” that “meets the needs for people to grieve in their own way”- meetings that he will attend.

He added: “It also allows me to look at the state of condition of our cemeteries- I believe we need to put some more resources into ensuring that they are much more accessible and much more respectful. We are rapidly running out of burial space- Broxtowe only has two years left- and we are looking to extend cemeteries and graveyards.”

Mr Mott added: “We can together work forward with a plan to try and accommodate the requests that are being made. We do need to consider everything, families that do follow the rules, disabled access, safety issues on the back of operational implications, reopening graves.”

Speaking after the meeting, families expressed caution. Lindsey told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “It’s good that we’ve been given a 12-month period of rest and can work with the council, but we are still left with doing some more research. And not knowing where we stand, we’ve still got a lot of uncertainties which will obviously still cause us considerable stress.”

Lesley Webb who wants to bury the ashes of her late husband Peter in Beeston Cemetery, said: “We’ve spoken on behalf of everybody, we’ve had a nice meeting, everybody’s been polite- we haven’t finished yet.” Mr Mott confirmed that notices will be removed from Chilwell Cemetery following today’s meeting.

The families said they also want to discuss a three-strikes rule for plot owners. They also agreed glassware and spiked fencing can be removed for health and safety reasons, and want better communication from the service.