Coventry widower describes 'horrendous' funeral

A widower has hit out at the cost of funerals during the coronavirus pandemic.

Neville Wilson's wife Doreen died from lung cancer in March and her funeral took place during lockdown.

Only five mourners could attend the service in Coventry under the government guidelines on social distancing.

While the ceremony was cut down - from 45 minutes to 15 minutes - the fee charged by Coventry City Council was not.

"It felt like a pauper's funeral. It couldn't get any worse if we'd tried," machine engineer Mr Wilson said.

Andrew Walster, from Coventry City Council, said service times had to be cut to introduce deep cleaning in the chapels between services and to increase the number of service slots in a day to account for the rise in deaths.

As a result, he said its own costs rose, not fell.