Burial services

East Lothian Council is committed to ensuring the safety of all visitors, staff and contractors in our cemeteries. As a burial authority, we have a legal duty under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 and the Occupiers Liability (Scotland) Act 1960 to maintain cemeteries in a safe condition.

The recently introduced Burial Management Regulations 2025 require burial authorities to carry out regular scheduled inspections to identify any headstone or memorial which is not in safe order.

These inspections are essential to prevent accidents caused by unstable memorials and are conducted in line with Scottish Government guidelines and best practices issued by the ICCM (Institute of Cemetery and Crematorium Management) followed by councils across Scotland.

We intend to inspect all headstones on a five-yearly basis as identified in the Health and Safety Executive's Guidelines on Headstone Inspection.

While we have a duty of care to ensure safety within our cemeteries, each headstone remains the responsibility of the lair holder. If issues are identified, it is the lair holder's responsibility to arrange repairs with a memorial mason.

Each headstone will be assessed by a fully trained staff member.

Any headstones found to be unstable will have a sign (pictured) fixed to the stone by plastic banding or zip ties advising the lair owner the headstone is unsafe:

This sign will be affixed to unsafe headstones.

If a memorial has been identified as unsafe and family members wish to have it reinstated, they will need to instruct a qualified stonemason to reinstate the memorial to the current approved standard (BS8415).

Do not attempt repairs yourself.

For your safety and that of others, do not attempt to repair, adjust or move the memorial yourself. Memorials can be extremely heavy and unstable when compromised and untrained handling may result in serious injury or damage to the memorial. Only qualified memorial masons should carry out such work.

Measures will be taken to make unstable memorials safe. This could include:

• supporting the memorial with wooden posts and heavy-duty plastic banding for memorials up to 1.5m high (for a maximum period of 18 months, then the memorial will be socketed unless we have been informed of imminent repairs)
• socketing the memorial (digging approximately one third of the memorials height into the ground)
• in very extreme circumstances where various factors including the condition of the memorial, its size and weight and limited space to bring in suitable lifting equipment dictate, we may have to topple a memorial under controlled conditions to remove the risk it poses and to minimise the likelihood of any damage should the memorial come down on its own. Once the memorial is safely on the ground, we will then socket it so that it continues to serve its purpose as a grave marker while no longer posing a threat to safety.
• in some circumstances we may have to cordon off dangerous memorials until we are able to make them safe. For your safety please do not enter the cordoned off area, we will make the memorial safe and remove the cordon as soon as possible.

We understand that some families may arrive at the cemetery without prior knowledge of these inspections. We sincerely apologise for any distress this may cause, but public safety remains our priority.