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NSW Labor to fight re-usable grave laws

NSW Labor has pledged to block cemetery laws designed to address a shortage of burial sites across Sydney.

Palm trees and gravestones at Port Botany cemetery in Sydney
NSW Labor plans to block cemetery laws designed to address a shortage of burial sites in Sydney. (AAP)

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Source: AAP


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The NSW opposition has released a list of government MPs who voted in favour of grave-recycling laws as it resolves to block them in the upper house.

Nationals MP Andrew Fraser was among the coalition members who helped the Cemeteries and Crematoria Bill pass the lower house last week, but he expressed reservations.

"I do not care if I am turned into fertiliser and tossed on the paddock, but I believe the issues in this legislation have not been sufficiently considered," he told parliament before voting.

"A Christian of poor means who cannot afford to maintain a grave site may find that, after 25 years, granny gets moved."

The bill, expected to be put to vote on Wednesday, is designed to address a shortage of burial space in Sydney.

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Rookwood Cemetery in the city's west divvied up its last major expanse of burial land in May.

Under the proposal, rolling leases of a minimum 25 years could be renewed for up to 99 years.

If a lease is not renewed after two years, a person's remains could be dug up and the site reused.

The remains could be re-buried deeper underground or moved to an ossuary house.

Labor primary industries spokesman Steve Whan said the bill lacked community support.

"The premier has never explained to the public why he believes renewable 25-year plots are a good idea," he said on Tuesday.

Under the proposed laws, renewable burial rights could not be granted in any part of a cemetery set aside for religious or cultural groups that believe in perpetual interment.

Primary Industries Minister Katrina Hodgkinson has defended the bill, saying "limited tenure grave sites" already existed in NSW and the bill would simply regulate them.

"(The concept) is already available to the cemetery operators that service almost 75 per cent of the market," she told parliament.


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