PLANS to create a new cemetery at Ipsley Meadow moved a step closer after members of Redditch Borough Council’s Overview and Scrutiny Committee recommended it as the preferred option for future burial provisions.
They met to scrutinise a report on the future of cemetery provisions Monday night (December 13).
The report recommended that the council continue to provide new burial provision, and that Ipsley Church Lane be progressed as the preferred option to provide new provision and for £320,000 to be budgeted to progress the plan.
Councillors voted in favour for all three points to be recommended to the cabinet, which meets today.
Councillor Aled Evans, portfolio holder for environmental services, said: “This is an issue that needs to be gripped now or we run the risk of no provision in this borough for the people who live and work in the borough and want to remain here when their time on this earth has come to an end.
“Let’s get it through to the executive to consider and get officers to get on with the job of getting us a new cemetery for the future.”
Owing to significant local interest in the application, and limitations on the numbers of public physically able to attend at the venue, the meeting will be livestreamed on YouTube.
The committee has also made special extended public speaking arrangements for the meeting over and above the normal limits.
Resident Joanna Kane said: “The development of a cemetery on part of Arrow Valley Country Park seems like a land grab and sets a dangerous precedent for the future of the whole park.
“We do know that more than 800 people felt so strongly about the planning application that they took the time to write individual objections online, but they were all ignored.”
