Cemeteries should be open or not?

[knittingaddict]

This is in the coronavirus regulations:

(8) A person who is responsible for a crematorium or burial ground must ensure that, during the emergency period, the crematorium is closed to members of the public, except for funerals or burials.

However Robert Jenrick said today that parks and cemeteries should remain open. So that goes against the laws put in place? I'm easily confused, but is there an explanation for this? Did he just misspeak? Is the crematorium the building where cremations are held (according to the regulations) or does this include the grounds as well.

Our local crem has a massive burial ground and the whole of the grounds are closed to the public.

I know that probably no one knows on here, but I was curious what others thought.

Crematorium is the building.

I'm also interested in the answer to this

The cemetery and crematorium are separate.
The cemetery grounds are to remain open for people to visit and pay their respects.
As they should be.

So you should be able to go into the burial grounds surrounding it then? I can't see any logical reason why the whole grounds need to be closed as long as people are respectful and do social distancing.

I hope they open ours soon. It is massive, has hardly any people visiting it and is perfect for a walk. I love visiting cemeteries.

The graveyard where my mum is buried has a gate with a lock and I'm not sure if it's open. Just wanted to take the Mothers Day tulips off as they'll be rotten and stinky by now. It's only a 5minute walk away, think I'll have to go and check for myself.

I took it to mean that cemeteries and burial grounds need to reopen so people can visit. Hopefully I'll be able to go next week as have missed anniversaries of DM and DSis.

Yes they'll be open from tomorrow after that announcement

So now the council's will have to make sure they have staff to tidy it , litter pick etc , more workers out and about and on public transport

And he said that poor 13 year old shouldn't have had a funeral without his family there, that was because they were self isolating and had symptoms , so the funeral director and local authority will be hauled over the coals for it, more work for the local authority , it was a faith service, so had to be done in 24 hours so wasn't anyone's fault , domt think he should have brought it up tbh, not at this point at any rate

Had an email back from the crematorium/cemetery. They won't be opening the site because there is a crematorium on the land. We are all following the guidelines closely, but this has upset me for some reason. Probably because I can't see the reasoning behind it and all the other restrictions make sense, to me at least. Oh well.

OP, the whole lockdown is inhuman but I was particularly shocked to hear this.

Oh that's a shame. Does the crematorium operate 7 days a week? If not I wonder if they could open the cemetery on the days when it isn't running.

Our local Cemetary is open (no building though). The council have taken the gate off so you can walk in without touching anything. I went at the weekend and it was deserted - much safer than the busy pavements outside my house. No need to social distance, as there was no one there to distance from.

The cemetery five minutes walk from us has been open throughout. Am glad, as it's a lovely place and I love taking my children to visit people we've lost and think about the stories of those who lie within.

Sorry OP, the regulations do apply equally to a crematorium and its grounds. A cemetery or burial ground should be open, the same as parks.

It makes sense now. Our crematorium/cemetery is now home to a temporary morgue.