‘SCROUNGING for graves,’ is how Independent Cllr Danny Collins described the desperate need for burial plots in Schull, and other towns in West Cork.
The issue was discussed at several Council meetings, but at the recent West Cork Municipal District it was the turn of Social Democrats Cllr Ross O’Connell (SD) to table a motion calling for action.
Senior executive officer MacDara Ó h-Icí recently confirmed that a reconfiguration of Schull graveyard, which would involve getting rid of one of the access roads, could yield an additional 32 spaces.
Councillors there is a maximum of six spaces left in Schull.
In situations where graves are in short supply, the Council says it does not provide spaces ‘in advance’.
But with a serious shortage of plots in graveyards in Glengarriff, Goleen, Skibbereen, and Kilcrohane, councillors said people – particularly older people who want to get their affairs in order – are worried.
‘People with elderly loved ones are finding it very difficult to get spaces,’ according to Cllr O’Connell.
Cllr Danny Collins said he got a phone call from a lady whose nephew had passed away in the UK and the family wanted to bring him home.
‘They were told there was no grave available,’ said the councillor, who confirmed that a grave had since been found for this gentleman.
‘The problem should never have got to this stage. We are scrounging out graves,’ he said.
Cllr Joe Carroll (FF) said members had been complaining about the lack of burial plots for the last four or five years.
Cllr Patrick Gerard Murphy (FF) said the Council needs to take action immediately and place advertisements in newspapers outlining the urgent need for land to extend several West Cork’s graveyards.
‘It would help,’ he added, ‘if people knew that the market rate for land would be paid.’
Cllr Karen Coakley (Ind) agreed that the Council ‘needs to put a plan in place’ and Cllr Declan Hurley (Ind) warned: ‘The further west you go, the harder it is to get land.’
