Our funeral poverty project, Down to Earth, has reviewed the Commission’s recommendations.
The UK Commission on Bereavement has recently published its report and recommendations after taking evidence from a wide range of sources about people’s experiences of bereavement and of arranging a funeral. The Commission is an independent group chaired by the Bishop of London, and the report makes far-reaching recommendations to government and other stakeholders for better supporting people experiencing bereavement.
Quaker Social Action’s Down to Earth co-manager for strategic work on funeral poverty, Lindesay Mace, had submitted written and oral evidence to the Commission in 2021. This drew upon Down to Earth’s unique perspective as provider of the only UK-wide helpline for people struggling with funeral costs. QSA is pleased to see that a number of measures QSA has been calling for have found their way into the Commission’s recommendations.
Background to the Commission’s report
The Commission’s report, Bereavement is Everyone’s Business, starts from the premise that bereavement is a universal experience that will “touch all of our lives at some point” but that it will “impact on each of us differently”.
The Commission was established in June 2021 in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic in the UK. It recognised that the pandemic was leading to hundreds of thousands more people being bereaved than in previous years. The Commission sought to understand “what new challenges emerged as a result of the pandemic, and how it exacerbated existing problems”, as well as taking a longer term look at “key challenges affecting bereaved people throughout the last five years”.
The Commission consulted with people who had been bereaved during the past five years, and with bereavement related charities and service providers, as well as reviewing existing literature about bereavement experiences.
“Between autumn 2021 and March 2022, the UK Commission on Bereavement heard from more than a thousand bereaved individuals, as well as organisations and professionals working with bereaved people, on experiences of bereavement and the support needs of people who have been bereaved.”
UK Commission on bereavement
Overarching its many recommendations, in its report the Commission has set out a vision for change, expressed as a series of I statements, meaning “the things we want all bereaved people across the UK – our friends, family, neighbours, ourselves – to be able to say.”
QSA’s input to the Commission’s research
During late 2021 QSA’s Down to Earth team gave oral evidence to two of the Commission’s sessions – on the financial impact of bereavement, and on the funeral industry – as well as providing a detailed written submission.
In the financial impact session Down to Earth’s Lindesay Mace was able to summarise issues around the high cost of funerals – the focus of the Competition and Markets Authority’s investigation into the funerals market during 2018-2021 – as well as highlighting how people are impacted by changes to their income following the death of a loved one. She explained how worries about funeral costs can impede people’s grieving process:
“The financial stress impacts on people’s ability to grieve – they have no mental space in which to do this while they are so worried about the fact their husband, mother, son is still lying in the morgue or at a funeral director and has not been put to rest.”
Down to Earth's Lindesay Mace
Lindesay also highlighted how bereaved people can encounter administrative and financial headaches around changes in benefit entitlements, where benefits were linked with the person who has died or where the death creates the need for a new benefit claim. Also how Down to Earth often sees people facing homelessness (or being expected to downsize quickly) because they are unable to succeed the tenancy in a council property where they lived with the deceased. We also see situations where the main income earner has died, the survivor receives benefits and the private landlord of the property where they live won’t let them stay because the rent would have to be paid by Universal Credit.
Another benefits-related issue highlighted by Lindesay is the fact that most full time students are ineligible to apply for government support towards the cost of a funeral if they find themselves bereaved and unable to pay (for eligible people, the Funeral Expenses Payment, or the Funeral Support Payment in Scotland, can help with part of the cost of a simple funeral). Lindesay also highlighted that people with no recourse to public funds are ineligible to apply for these benefits.
In the funeral industry session Lindesay Mace used evidence from Down to Earth’s casework to illustrate the need for industry regulation (licensing and inspection) and price caps. Both of these potential measures had been looked at by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) during its 2018-2021 investigation into the funeral industry. However the CMA did not pursue price controls, citing exceptional pressures on the funeral industry caused by the Covid-19 pandemic; whilst the UK government’s response to the CMA’s recommendation to regulate the industry was to propose a voluntary, co-regulatory approach.
QSA’s response to the Commission’s report and recommendations
QSA welcomes the genuine efforts made by the Commission to hear from people with recent experience of bereavement; and we welcome its thorough report and wide-ranging recommendations published in October 2022.
quaker social action
QSA is particularly pleased to see that the Commission has included the following recommendations within its report.
“The Competition and Markets Authority must carry out its proposed further market investigation into the funeral industry now the exceptional circumstances of the pandemic are passed.”
- QSA has been calling for this in our ongoing engagement with the CMA.
“New regulations must be created setting out minimum standards for public health funerals.”
- Public health funerals are funerals which are provided by local authorities through a statutory duty, in cases where no suitable funeral arrangements are otherwise being made.
- In 2021 QSA published a report from Down to Earth’s own research which showed that many local authorities were not complying with existing legal duties or voluntary guidance regarding public health funerals; QSA agrees that the regulatory regime around public health funerals needs to be strengthened.
“Entitlements to financial support following a bereavement must be extended to key groups”, meaning extending the right to apply for the Funeral Expenses Payment to currently excluded groups including students, and people with no recourse to public funds.
- The ineligibility of most students to apply for Funeral Expenses Payment or Funeral Support Payment (as they are not usually in receipt of another qualifying benefit) was one of the points raised directly by Lindesay Mace to the Commission, as was the ineligibility of people with no recourse to public funds.
- The hardship caused by students’ exclusion from government support with funeral costs has been highlighted by a client of the Down to Earth helpline who spoke to the media (external link) about the issue in 2020.
“[Extending eligibility for] Bereavement Support Payment to cohabiting partners and those whose partner was unable to make sufficient NI [national Insurance] contributions due to sickness or disability.”
- Although the Bereavement Support Payment is not technically a funeral-related benefit, Down to Earth knows from its casework that some bereaved families need to use it towards funeral costs.
- Down to Earth has consistently supported a campaign (led by the Childhood Bereavement Network, Child Poverty Action Group and WAY Widowed and Young) to extend eligibility for this benefit to cohabiting (unmarried) couples with children, and this is due to happen following a test case that was brought before the courts. QSA supports calls for the benefit to be further extended to cohabiting couples without children, as per the Commission’s recommendation – and those with insufficient NI contributions due to sickness or disability.
“All benefits for bereaved people must be up-rated annually in line with inflation in all four nations.”
- QSA has long called for (including in its evidence submissions to the Commission) the value of funeral-related benefits to be increased. We would go further than the Commission’s recommendation: we believe that the Funeral Expenses Payment and Funeral Support Payment should cover the whole cost of a simple funeral, for those eligible.
“Legislation must require that landlords give at least six months’ notice for an eviction when an original tenant dies. This must apply to all tenancies in both the private and social rented sectors.”
- In its evidence to the Commission, QSA had highlighted ways in which bereavement can increase people’s risk of homelessness.
“To deliver all of the above recommendations, each UK Government must establish and deliver a cross-departmental strategy for bereavement that recognises support following bereavement as a human right.”
- QSA supports a human rights approach to addressing key issues around bereavement; in the coming months QSA will be advocating for funeral poverty to be a focus of the United Nation’s Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights during their 2023-24 review of the UK’s compliance with human rights law.