Community funerals

We are asked regularly for the following information about these funerals from various sources -

• full names of deceased persons
• dates of death
• marital status
• maiden surnames of married or widowed females
• dates of birth or ages at death
• last known addresses
• estimated value of estates
• date(s) when the information was passed (or information that is about to be or likely to be passed) to the Government Legal Department (formerly Treasury Solicitor) or the Duchy of Lancaster or Cornwall or any other 3rd party

We have therefore decided to proactively publish this information on a bi-monthly basis to promote open data and transparency and to avoid repeat requests for the same information. We are able to publish this data because the Data Protection Act 2018 and General Data Protection Regulations 2016 only applies to living individuals, it does not protect the privacy of deceased persons.

Although we do publish some address details, we don’t give out specific house numbers or names. This is because Section 31 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 applies to withhold information which could affect the prevention and detection of crime. We believe that as the deceased’s property is likely to be unoccupied and may still contain personal papers and belongings, making the last known address of the deceased public, would be likely to prejudice the prevention of crime by enabling or encouraging the commission of offences.

You can find details of Public Health (Community Funerals) dealt with between 2015 and 2023.

You can find the Public Health Funerals undertaken so far in 2024. New data will be added every 2 months as new cases arise.

Should you have any queries about this data - 

Contact us