Southwark Plans for Camberwell Old & New Cemeteries.

[Penguin68]

Burial plots are unsuitable for a third of residents by faith

This assumes that all those identified as Jewish or Moslem are ultra-orthodox - most of my Jewish friends do not eat 'kosher' (even where they culturally eschew pork) - many of my Moslem friends drink alcohol - for many of these (perhaps most) if they want burial they do not require full orthodox rights. And once again - this group wants NO burial plots for ANYONE in Southwark.

[oddlycurious]

Hello again Blanche (or anyone else from the group) - you were quite busy online yesterday so surprised you couldn't find the time to engage with the public, so I'll repeat myself

Yes or no: do SSW support an increase in burial provision for all faiths in the borough?

You can't argue that the provision of burial plots is discriminating against faiths if your aim is to have no burial at all.

[Blanche Cameron]

Camberwell Cemetery made the South London Press

Church of England let town hall chiefs clear out cemetery for more grave space

https://www.londonnewsonline.co.uk/19143/church-england-let-town-hall-chiefs-clear-cemetery-grave-space/

"Councillor Ian Wingfield, cabinet member for environment and public realm, said: We are delighted that the Diocese has approved our plans to create more burial spaces in Southwark. Local people will now continue to have the choice to be buried locally, rather than being forced to pay higher costs for burials outside of the borough."

Many, if not most Muslims and Jewish residents in the borough, are denied the benefit of being buried locally at lower cost. Religious discrimination - asking Muslims and Jewish residents to pay taxes for burial they cannot use - is just one of many reasons why Southwark?s burial project must stop at once. You cannot provide burial for some residents and not others - especially when they are at least a third if not half of your residents who need burial.

And Southwark is spending millions subsidising these ?new? burial plots. Subsidies per plot are at least ?1,000 and quite possibly ?3,000 or more in real terms - in this time when Southwark is cutting back on other services.

Blank cheque for burial: http://www.savesouthwarkwoods.org.uk/blank-cheque-burial-service/4593627679

It is the position of the Friends that those with rights for additional interments in the Cemeteries should be allowed to use them. The Friends are fighting to save all the 100 acres of the Camberwell Cemeteries and make them Nature Reserves with respect for the dead and their memorials and land for the living ? for health, happiness and the common good into the future. The playing fields, allotments, wooded hillsides and Honor Oak Nature corridor land are too valuable as they are to be used for burial.

Statement from 17 December 2016 On letting the cemeteries return to nature: http://www.savesouthwarkwoods.org.uk/first-rewilding-of-cemeteries/4591351349

Blanche Cameron

Friends of Camberwell Cemeteries / Save Southwark Woods Campaign

07731 304 966 [email protected]

[www.savesouthwarkwoods.org.uk]

Twitter: @southwarkwoods Facebook: Save Southwark Woods

Friends of Camberwell Cemeteries was founded as Save Southwark Woods in January 2015 to stop the destruction of the woods and graves of Camberwell Old and New Cemeteries.

We are for maintaining recreational activities already taking place on cemetery grounds, such as the Recreation Ground and the Allotments.

We are for preserving the cemeteries as Memorial Park Nature Reserves, like Nunhead or Highgate Cemeteries.

Old Nursery Site Statement: http://www.savesouthwarkwoods.org.uk/inner-city-burial-land-grab/4592635119

[oddlycurious]

Having spent a lot of time accusing other people of not listening you don't seem to want to engage.

[taper]

Oh boy, what a state this campaign has descended into. It is a study in how not to run a public campaign. To alienate so many people takes a special talent.

[Siduhe]

I'm also interested in the answer but for a slightly different reason. As someone who walks through CCO most days and supports reasonable, additional burial provision in COC and elsewhere in Southwark, including for religious reasons (I've talked about this on here before), AND who tried to engage with the Save Southwark Woods campaign in their early days, I was very much given to understand that your group didn't support religious beliefs as grounds for burial at all. Certainly people in your group called it "mumbo jumbo" and a lot worse to my face - which is your/their prerogative and I have no issue with it.

But I do find it disingenuous (at best) that you now want to support religious burial for Jewish and Muslim faiths as a ground for stopping the burial plans when, as far as I know, your group don't support any religious burial at all. Or if your position has changed on that, it would be good to know how it has changed.

[Sue]

Good luck with getting an answer on that ...

[taper]

Ditto Siduhe. I engaged with the group over a year ago and quickly disengaged because they were clearly not going to brook any notion of discussion or compromise with the council or other interested parties. The religious discrimination idea is purely tactical and disinegenous.

[Penguin68]

It is the position of the Friends that those with rights for additional interments in the Cemeteries should be allowed to use them.

Well, that's big of you - you're not then in favour of the arbitrary and illegal removal of paid-for rights then, so direct theft isn't part of your agenda. Just indirect theft of the right to burial in the cemeteries for 'new' families, whilst there is still (or could be) space for this.

I forecast (from the start) that the Diocese would support the council's application - being as they are in favour of burial and that there are clear requirements as to how the Council can go about its re-use plans - and that, as it is outside their remit in municipal cemeteries, issues about gardening and tree management wouldn't be issues for them.

The Diocese has 'decided to support' exactly and precisely what is set out in law and which matches the church's preferred options. No grave will be disturbed where the last occupant was buried less than 75 years ago (many continental graveyards require bones to be moved to ossuaries far quicker) - so it is unlikely (but not impossible) that any mourners who actually knew the deceased will still be living (not so for child interments, possibly).

Frankly this is a victory for common sense BUT it is important to ensure that the council now does what it has declared it intends to do. And in particular it must now sort out issues of storm run-off - where that is an issue - ponding and plan for appropriate tree planting, ideally native species which may cope with a warmer climate. Genuine friends of the cemeteries (rather than anti-burial agitators) need to keep a close eye on delivery - and I hope the relevant Councilor (Renata I think?) does so as well.

[dbboy]

Aren't Friends of Camberwell Cemeteries / Save Southwark Woods being discriminatary against those who wish be buried in either Camberwell old and new cemeteries by stating no new burials?

[Sally Eva]

Blanche Cameron wrote:

"The playing fields, allotments, wooded hillsides and Honor Oak Nature corridor land are too valuable as they are to be used for burial."

Has anyone suggested that they should? The playing fields and allotments are in Lewisham.

I would personally be strongly against turning Peckham Rye Park into a burial ground. SSW should think big. There are no end of places which are too valuable to be used for burial.

[oddlycurious]

Having spent months if not years accusing everyone else of not listening, Blanche and co. seem reluctant to engage with the public via a public local forum. The time spent writing inflammatory and rude tweets might be better spent presenting a clear argument to people who want to listen.

[Blanche Cameron]

FOI Request regarding discrimination:

7 Muslims are buried in Southwark Cemeteries every year, on average, against 244 Christians - a Freedom of Information request shows. And that doesn't count the 176 people of other, non-Islamic faiths, including Humanists, Hindus, and Others. That's 420 to 7 - every year.

Read it here in full, including Southwark's data: http://www.savesouthwarkwoods.org.uk/foi-religious-discrimination/4593695024

Muslim residents make up about 10% of Southwark?s population of just over 300,000 ? that?s 30,000 people. But they make up between one third and a half of all residents whose faith requires them to bury their dead.

We believe Southwark's burial provision to be illegal and is just one reason why burial in Southwark cannot continue.

Friends of Camberwell Cemeteries / Save Southwark Woods campaign are not seeking to stop burial - only to stop burial in Southwark's Cemeteries. People's existing rights to interment in the cemeteries must be respected.

Southwark is disrespecting the dead and their families by mounding over graves and by working to remove the rights of those that were buried in perpetuity. It is Southwark who will be digging up the dead to sell burial plots. Our position is that these are cemeteries and should remain cemeteries, with respect for the dead.

If you have a question which you feel has not been answered by me, please email or call me. We also meet most Tuesday's at The Herne Tavern.

Blanche Cameron

Friends of Camberwell Cemeteries / Save Southwark Woods Campaign

07731 304 966 [email protected]

[www.savesouthwarkwoods.org.uk]

Twitter: @southwarkwoods Facebook: Save Southwark Woods

Friends of Camberwell Cemeteries was founded as Save Southwark Woods in January 2015 to stop the destruction of the woods and graves of Camberwell Old and New Cemeteries.

We are for maintaining recreational activities already taking place on cemetery grounds, such as the Recreation Ground and the Allotments.

We are for preserving the cemeteries as Memorial Park Nature Reserves, like Nunhead or Highgate Cemeteries.

[oddlycurious]

Blanche, don't just turn up, copy and paste your press releases and go. Stop. Talk to us. People are asking you do this.

[taper]

So Blanche, presumably representatives of Southwark's orthodox Jewish and Muslim communities are up in arms about this? Have they made representations?

I saw the (somewhat hyperbolic and offensive) quote on your website - "This is London in 2017 with a Muslim Mayor, not Selma, Alabama in 1965." - but I couldn't see any evidence there had been objections from representatives of these communities.

[JoeLeg]

Blanche Cameron stated

"We believe Southwark's burial provision to be illegal and is just one reason why burial in Southwark cannot continue."

Blanche, here's a straight question - have you taken legal advice on this position, or is anyone involved with your group a solicitor or barrister who feels confident on that point?

If so then fair enough. If not then it's nothing but conjecture.

[Siduhe]

Friends of Camberwell Cemeteries / Save Southwark Woods campaign are not seeking to stop burial - only to stop burial in Southwark's Cemeteries. People's existing rights to interment in the cemeteries must be respected.

RELIGIOUS DISCRIMINATION:

Southwark knows thousands of their residents have specific burial needs that Southwark don?t and won?t serve. Southwark is not planning to provide burial for the majority of these residents ? yet they are taking their taxes.

Our position is that these are cemeteries and should remain cemeteries, with respect for the dead.

Blanche, these statements seem inherently contradictory to me and I'm still really struggling with the idea that your group feels comfortable using something as personal as people's religion as grounds to stop all religious burials in Southwark of any kind.

At least you have confirmed that your group wants to stop all burials in Southwark - regardless of whether these are Christian, Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, atheist or agnostic. With that confirmation, your arguments about religious discrimination are irrelevant and in pretty poor taste in my view.

[oddlycurious]

SSW are not pro faith, they are pro somewhere to go for a walk on Sundays. They have changed their tune and now want the council to pay ??? for burial for all, as long as it's nowhere near them. I believe the term is NIMBY.

[nxjen]

The matter of Muslim burial has been addressed in Southwark Council's Cemetery Strategy.

- The Executive Summary states that provision for Muslim burials is proposed in Camberwell New Cemetery

- Short Term options (til 2022) Para 6.2.1 "Muslim burial - Expansion of existing site (within Nunhead) on previously topped up ground, and provision elsewhere in new layouts"

- Next steps short and medium term Para 9.1.1 "Include provision for Muslim burial"

[Sally Eva]

There is an area of Nunhead Cemetery which appears to be specifically for Muslim burials.

[Abe_froeman]

Surely you mean "Nunhead Forest and Safari Park" rather than "Nunhead Cemetery"?

[dbboy]

Have Blanche and co got permission from the families of all the graves they continually post on twitter, I doubt very much? And if I were a relative I would be most upset at a group of individuals purporting to be a pressure group posting pictures WITHOUT said CONSENT.

[Sue]

Abe_froeman Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Surely you mean "Nunhead Forest and Safari Park"

> rather than "Nunhead Cemetery"?

😀

[Sally Eva]

I am a pressure group which believes that Southwark cemeteries should remain cemeteries and that is why no one should be buried in them

[Blanche Cameron]

Sorry, I don't have a lot of time to spend on here. Thanks for your questions. Issues come up all the time which are worth publicising. Religious discrimination is one of these, along with flood risk, refusal to produce financial information on spending to date and so on, as well as the main issues of the destruction of valuable inner city greenspace and graves.

[We will be holding a meeting soon for the families who concerned about their loved one's resting places. I will let you know when and where that will be.]

Southwark tries to justify the destruction by claiming it is to provide burial for ALL residents, regardless of their religious practices. But they are not doing this, as their own figures show. As EdAus pointed out, the Equality Act 2010 prohibits local authorities from providing services which appear not to discriminate but, in fact, do so in the way they are delivered ('indirect discrimination').

I would hope everyone would feel that discriminating against residents because of their religion is wrong. If you feel differently, that's your right obviously. But Southwark has a duty to provide services fairly and proportionately.

Other boroughs are investing in burial space for all residents' needs on the edge of the city. Southwark's cemeteries were on the edge of the city too when they were created.

Most questions can be answered on our website. Click on NEWS at http://www.savesouthwarkwoods.org.uk/news/4588391437. If anyone wants to meet up and have a chat I'd be very happy to, or feel free to email me about anything: [email protected] and I'll try and reply quickly.

Blanche Cameron

Friends of Camberwell Cemeteries / Save Southwark Woods Campaign

07731 304 966 [email protected]

[www.savesouthwarkwoods.org.uk]

Twitter: @southwarkwoods Facebook: Save Southwark Woods

Friends of Camberwell Cemeteries was founded as Save Southwark Woods in January 2015 to stop the destruction of the woods and graves of Camberwell Old and New Cemeteries.

We are for maintaining recreational activities already taking place on cemetery grounds, such as the Recreation Ground and the Allotments.

We are for preserving the cemeteries as Memorial Park Nature Reserves, like Nunhead or Highgate Cemeteries.