Law Commission consultation on New Funerary Methods

Overview

This is a public consultation by the Law Commission for England and Wales.

New Funerary Methods are potential alternatives to the established funerary methods of burial, cremation and burial at sea. Although not currently regulated in England and Wales, some new funerary methods, such as alkaline hydrolysis and human composting, are available in other jurisdictions. This consultation is an important step towards our ultimate aim to make recommendations to Government about a future-proof framework, along with a draft Bill, which will enable the regulation of new funerary methods.

For more information about this project, click here.

We recommend that consultees read the Consultation Paper before responding to the consultation. There is a glossary included at the beginning of the Consultation Paper. A shorter summary of the Consultation Paper is also available in English, Welsh and easy-read. All documents are available on the New Funerary Methods project page, at https://lawcom.gov.uk/project/new-funerary-methods/.

Consultees do not need to answer all the questions if they are only interested in some aspects of the consultation.

As part of our commitment to diversity, equality and inclusion, our policy is to use gender-neutral language in our work and correspondence. Using gender-neutral language promotes gender equality and challenges prejudicial assumptions and gender stereotypes.

The Law Commission encourages correspondents to retire the greeting “Dear Sir(s)” and instead address correspondence to the relevant Commissioner or specific project teams. Alternatively, correspondents may wish to use a more generic inclusive greeting such as “To whom it may concern”, “Dear colleague(s)”, “Dear Commissioner” or “Dear Law Commission".

As a consultative body, we will continue to treat all correspondence equally regardless of how it is addressed.

About the Law Commission: The Law Commission is a statutory body, created by the Law Commissions Act 1965 (“the 1965 Act”) for the purpose of promoting the reform of the law. It is an advisory Non Departmental Public Body sponsored by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ). The Law Commission is independent of Government. For more information about the Law Commission please click here.

Responses to this consultation: We aim to be transparent in our decision-making, and to explain the basis on which we have reached conclusions. We may publish or disclose information you provide in response to Law Commission papers, including personal information. For example, we may publish an extract of your response in Law Commission publications, or publish the response itself. We may also share responses with Government. Additionally, we may be required to disclose the information, such as in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000. We will process your personal data in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulation.

Consultation responses are most effective where we are able to report which consultees responded to us, and what they said. If you consider that it is necessary for all or some of the information that you provide to be treated as confidential and so neither published nor disclosed, please contact us before sending it. Please limit the confidential material to the minimum, clearly identify it and explain why you want it to be confidential. We cannot guarantee that confidentiality can be maintained in all circumstances and an automatic disclaimer generated by your IT system will not be regarded as binding on the Law Commission.

Alternatively, you may want your response to be anonymous. That means that we may refer to what you say in your response, but will not reveal that the information came from you. You might want your response to be anonymous because it contains sensitive information about you or your family, or because you are worried about other people knowing what you have said to us.

We list who responded to our consultations in our reports. If you provide a confidential response your name will appear in that list. If your response is anonymous we will not include your name in the list unless you have given us permission to do so.

For information about how we handle your personal data, please see our privacy notice.

Any queries can be directed to bcnfm@lawcommission.gov.uk.