In September, the NAFD submitted a detailed statement to the Independent Inquiry into the crimes of David Fuller.
The thirteen-page statement, written by Director of Policy and Public Affairs Rachel Bradburne, was accompanied by a copy of the NAFD inspectorate team code, a copy of the NAFD’s ‘Picking up the Pieces’ report into systemic delays in the death management process, information about membership admittance and how complaints are managed.
It included sections on the NAFD’s contribution to the Fuller Inquiry to date, a review of the UK funeral sector in 2023 and pressures it is under, the impact of changes in the regulatory and consumer environment, the role of regulators and their use of regulatory measures, how oversight of quality assurance is managed and what the NAFD would like to see in terms of how safeguarding the security and dignity of all deceased people is managed.
NAFD Chief Executive Andrew Judd said: “As the sector’s largest voluntary regulator in the UK, the NAFD has long been concerned about there being no oversight of other funeral businesses, outside of trade body membership, that are not part of a voluntary regulation scheme and therefore currently have no scrutiny of standards of care. Any funeral director that is not able to provide care of deceased people in a professional, respectful, and dignified manner and who is not able to manage security, through the monitoring of activity and the control of access, is not effectively safeguarding the deceased people in their care and must be prevented from trading.
“Ultimately, the NAFD would like to see all funeral businesses in the UK required to meet the same requirements as NAFD members through robust and independent oversight of standards. As a representative body for funeral directors, we continue to work with the NAFD inspectorate team and others across the sector to align all organisations that care for deceased people against a framework and common set of standards through which it can be demonstrated to all four UK Governments that those working in the funeral sector are professional, capable, appropriately trained and act in the public interest.
“However, we would not want to see disproportionately burdensome regulation that pushed smaller providers out of the market. An outcomes-based approach to quality, such as the Funeral Director Code, supported by independent inspections, would provide the flexibility to ensure that small and microbusinesses were able to flourish in any new regulatory environment, ensure a level playing field with regards to competition, and protect consumer choice in the future.”