Ashes-only burial plan for crowded cemetery

Quob Cemetery, otherwise known as West End Cemetery, is running out of space

A crowded cemetery could soon be restricted to ashes-only interments, a council has proposed.

Quob Cemetery in Hampshire has less than 20 years of burial space left, West End Parish Council said.

The authority said it would repeat a public consultation before making recommendations by the end of the year.

Local resident Sheila Bellamy, who recently lost her husband, said she was "shocked and upset" that a full burial might not be possible in future.

She said: "He definitely wouldn't have had a cremation and I feel it would have been so distressing to me if I couldn't have had had him buried.

"The old people who want to be buried won't realise. Their family [will] go to get a plot [and] they'll find that no, they can't be buried in the village.

"It's a disgrace if England can't bury their dead."

The parish council said the cemetery could not be expanded due to its location.

In a statement, it said: "Competing needs for land from building and agriculture means finding an alternative site would not be easy and would be extremely costly."

It said the "lack of burial provision" was a national problem.

Other councils have proposed using a pitch-and-putt course for burials and charging more for wider graves.

Meanwhile, Reading Borough Council (RBC), which previously said it would run out of burial space by 2030, is proposing to turn allotments into a graveyard.

RBC leader Liz Terry said: "In somewhere like Reading, it's a very strong economic area which means land prices are really high.

"So the thought of buying land that's suitable for burial and that's affordable was a challenge."

The Law Commission, which is reviewing burial space in England in Wales, has previously consulted on plans to reuse graves and reopen closed burial grounds.