Baby ashes scandal: Elephant sculpture to 'never forget'

A memorial to the children of the Mortonhall baby ashes scandal is to be officially unveiled in Edinburgh's Princes Street Gardens.

According to its creator, the 8ft (2.4m) baby elephant sculpture is a nod to the adage "elephants never forget".

It will be a permanent reminder of the 250 babies and their families affected by the scandal.

For years parents were told that there were no ashes to scatter after the cremation of their babies.

However, remains were being secretly buried in the garden of remembrance at Mortonhall Crematorium.

An investigation into the cremation of babies at the council-run facility over a period of 40 years found that the families of more than 250 dead babies were affected by the scandal.

• Why were bereaved parents denied baby ashes?

The Princes Street Gardens memorial is the second to remember the babies of the Mortonhall scandal, in line with the investigation's recommendations.

A memorial garden was unveiled at the crematorium in 2015, but the sculpture was commissioned as an additional memorial for parents who would find it difficult to return to Mortonhall.

The memorial garden at Mortonhall sits in the grounds of the crematorium, and includes specially designed plaques inscribed with the names of 149 babies

The 2.5-tonne bronze elephant sculpture was created by artist Andy Scott, who is best known for The Kelpies in Falkirk.

Mr Scott told BBC Scotland News that the statue's surface was embossed with forget-me-not flowers.

He said the flowers added to the "sentiment of always remembering and never letting this slip away".

He added that crafting the statue had difficulties.

Mr Scott said: "It brought with it a lot of challenges, but I can't say I've enjoyed the process - it's a strange thing to relate to.

"As long as the parents are happy, that's the main thing."

Dororthy Maitland's daughter's ashes were buried without her knowledge

Dororthy Maitland - the mother who first uncovered the scandal in 2012 - found that her daughter's ashes had been buried without her knowledge.

She said she felt "uplifted" by the statue and hoped other bereaved families would find "strength and comfort" in it.

She added: "Parents like myself will probably will never know what happened to their baby's ashes.

"But we have to try and go forward and draw comfort from what is available to us.

"We can't go back, we can't change it, sadly. I think we have to move on from it."

Dororthy Maitland and Andy Scott inspect the memorial

Mortonhall baby ashes scandal: What happened?

• In 2012, bereavement charity Sands (Stillbirth and neonatal death society) Lothian revealed that the cremated ashes of babies had been buried without parents' knowledge at Mortonhall.

• This had happened for more than four decades, until a change of management the previous year, and involved hundreds of babies.

• Sands discovered that, despite telling parents there were no ashes, the remains of cremated babies were being secretly buried in the crematorium's garden of remembrance.

• When the scandal emerged hundreds of parents whose infants had been cremated at Mortonhall demanded to know why this had happened.

• The original reason given by the council was that the crematorium had lacked the necessary equipment to return ashes to families from babies which were born before term or were just days old.

Baby ashes were buried in secret at Mortonhall for more than 40 years

• However, it quickly emerged that when new management had taken over Mortonhall in May 2011 they had begun to carry out such cremations at the end of the working day when the cremators were cooling down, in an effort to recover more ashes.

• It was also claimed by experts that Mortonhall had received extensive upgrades in 2004 to allow the cremators to be more easily controlled and that methods of doing this had been available for at least 20 years.

• As well as the inquiry into Mortonhall cases, a separate Infant Cremation Commission was established as a national response to the situation.

• The commission, chaired by former high court judge Lord Bonomy, thoroughly examined the policies and practices in all crematoria in Scotland and made 64 recommendations, including a statutory definition of ashes and regulation of cremation of babies of less than 24 weeks gestation.