Your rights to last rites

When it comes to final farewells, no longer are you restricted to a church or a crematorium for a service because funeral directors are more than happy to hold them at one’s home, in a park, a pub, or golf course—even at your favourite winery. 

Ceremonies can include the release eco-friendly balloons, butterflies, or doves while for the coffin, the options are endless. 

For your final resting place, you also have the choice of a full burial in a church yard with a headstone or, like a lot of people, you could be cremated and your ashes scattered at a meaningful place like the beach. 

You could also check out having a full body sea burial, although the paperwork would probably bury you long before you got within coo-ee of the ocean.

For Queenslander Alan Kirk, a traditional funeral is definitely not on the cards, and he wonders why people would pay a lot of money for “big flash caskets” only to have them burnt or buried. 

Instead, he’s settled on an eco burial, where the deceased is buried on a dedicated block of land within a crematorium where there are no tombstones. 

“People can come visit and they can visit the tree that commemorates everyone, but they have no idea where you are positioned on that block of land,” he says. 

At 54, Alan feels traditional funerals, where everyone sits around and cries, are morbid. Instead, along with the eco burial, he’s opting for a cocktail afternoon for friends and family.

“I went through the process with my dad when he passed a couple of years ago,” he explains. 

“Dad was pretty adamant he didn’t want a standard funeral.” 

For his father’s funeral, only immediate family attended an informal gathering with the coffin at the funeral directors to say goodbye, followed by a celebration of his life the next day. 

Alan says it’s exactly what his father wanted. 

“Dad was the type of person who, at a function, would always go around and get everyone a drink and introduce them to other people,” he explains. 

“He was a happy guy, so that set the way we did the function area—it was bright and colourful, and echoed what his life was about.”

Asha Dooley, general manager of Grace Funerals, Penrith and North Shore, New South Wales, reckons alternate funerals are becoming almost mainstream these days. 

In her 12th year as a funeral director, Asha says there’s a bit of a misconception about what people can and can’t do at a funeral, and the alternate options available. 

“[Alternate means] different to a graveside service or a church service or at a traditional crematorium,” she explains. 

“I personally go to golf clubs several times a week where we do full funeral services, and I’ve been going to people’s backyards for the last decade. 

“We’ve also done funeral services at lagoons and other areas that are special to the family. 

“The great thing about the funeral industry is that we’re all really open to working with the families to ensure we have an authentic service for that family member and for the families themselves. That could be a full Mass or it could be out in your backyard with a song instead of a eulogy.” 

Of all the funerals she has organised, Asha says a real standout was the one where they went to a local lagoon and guests were asked to bring their own chair or picnic rug. 

“We had a rustic coffin called a willow, which is a woven basket, and we weaved flowers through it. 

“We were able to be really at one with nature, which was really important to the family. The person who had passed away was a bushwalker, and this was one of the areas he walked in pretty much every day. 

“It was more about the connectivity to the person who had passed away than the fact that we were outside. That was what was authentic to him and really important to the family.” 

Asha says people often look to releasing balloons and butterflies as a physical expression of saying goodbye but there are other options as well. 

“We have what we call a floral reflection or a time of reflection during the service where you can get up and touch the coffin and maybe place a flower or an item that’s special to that person on the coffin,” she explains. 

Asha says wrapped caskets are also another popular choice for funerals, allowing loved ones to help design a personalised casket with photos of the loved one on it. 

“We also have beautiful wooden and plain coffins that can be painted with beautiful murals.”

Despite the multitude of options available, Asha says significantly more cremations than burials are carried out these days. 

"About 70% cremation and 30% burial, and there’s a number of reasons for that,” she says. 

“Culturally, we’re changing and there’s less of a desire for religious services these days. The Catholic Church has made it no longer mandatory to be buried.” 

Cost is also a factor. In Sydney, at the Macquarie Park Cemetery and Crematorium, Asha puts the cost of a burial plot at about $14,000. 

“That’s before you do a burial,” she says, “whereas if we were to do an unattended cremation at the same location, it’s less than $800. It’s a huge difference.” 

Michael Mackay of Mackay Family Funerals in Ourimbah, New South Wales, has been in the funeral industry 46 years. 

He says he’s seen a return to more traditional services over the past seven months. 

Speaking about eco funerals, Michael says they started in Lismore about 35 years ago and were never really successful. 

He says some used cardboard coffins while others only covered the body with a shroud and attempted to stand the body up to conserve space. 

He says another alternative type of funeral that also never seemed to take off was ‘aquamations’ which use less energy than cremations and have no direct emissions. 

For an aquamation, the body is placed in a stainless-steel chamber where water and alkali are added and the temperature is raised. As the circulation of hot water and alkali work together, the body ‘melts’, leaving the skeletal remains behind which are then processed into ashes.

In Victoria’s Thornbury, Mon Jones of Last Hurrah Funerals says their point of difference is bespoke service. 

“Everything we do is built from scratch. Everyone’s funeral is completely different, which can mean that we do something traditional or really outside the box,” she explains. 

Mon says they recently organised a funeral at a pub where a heavy metal band played and friends and family danced around the coffin, positioned in the middle of the dance floor. 

At Last Hurrah Funerals, their hearse is a converted 1974 white Cadillac sedan, however, they’ve also organised corteges with vintage cars, trucks, motorbikes, and even a horse and cart. 

“Sometimes we do a cortege of classic cars if the person is a car enthusiast, or we have Harleys following the hearse to the cemetery or crematorium,” Mon says. 

Last Hurrah does do natural burials, however, Mon says sea burials are a whole different ball game. 

“We have attempted to do one, but it just became so prohibitive for the family. It’s a long process to try and get a full body sea burial, but it is possible and costs around $20,000.” 

Sea burials are permitted only in waters with a depth greater than 3,000 metres. Sea burial sites must not conflict with other uses of the sea, such as trawling/fishing grounds. 

Due to these constraints, sea burial sites are usually located a long distance offshore. This can create logistical challenges in arranging the burial. 

‘Living wakes’ are another option, where people with terminal illnesses choose to have a final farewell they can attend. 

Mon says Last Hurrah has done about five of these and is working on one at the moment. 

“If someone does arrange everything before they die, they are taking a huge amount of admin off the plate of their loved ones so I personally think they should all be very grateful that they’re doing it because they’ve really made life a lot easier for other people who’ve been left behind,” she says. 

“I haven’t had any negative feedback about them. Having said that, there are probably people who are sitting in the room thinking it’s all a bit weird, but that’s okay. It’s not about them.” 

Mon says she’s found most family members are happy to carry out the wishes of the deceased. 

“Usually people’s main focus is to do right by the person who has died and honour their wishes,” she says.

Mon agrees there’s been a definite move towards cremations due to the rising cost of burial plots. 

She says the price of a plot and digging fees in Melbourne ranges from $3,000 to $100,000 depending on the location. Like house prices, the further away from Melbourne, the cheaper burial plots tend to be. 

When it comes to funding funerals, people have the option of taking out funeral insurance, prepaying their funeral with a particular funeral director, or taking out funeral bonds. 

If prepaying for a funeral, it’s important to do your homework. Michael Mackay, a board member with the National Funeral Directors Association NSW, says money for all prepaid funerals is required to be held in a government guaranteed scheme. 

He says it’s important to use a reputable funeral home when prepaying for funerals because there are a lot of “briefcase funeral directors” in Australia. 

“I know for a fact that a few of them have actually taken the funds, which is illegal, and ended up causing grief for a lot of people,” he explains. 

Michael says funeral bonds are different. 

A single person can place up to $15,500 into a bond that is taken off their assets for pension requirements. Funeral directors only get paid out of the bond when the time comes for the funeral, meaning funeral costs are charged at the going rate at the time of death, not when the funeral bond was established. Any unused funds in the bond will be returned to the family. 

As for funeral insurance, Michael says this suits some people’s financial situation, particularly those who can’t afford to prepay a funeral or use funeral bonds. 

“We had one lady who spent $35,000 in her lifetime on funeral insurance to cover a $9,000 funeral,” he says. 

“It definitely serves a purpose, but whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing economically… well, I sit on the fence on that one.”

This article is featured in National Seniors Australia’s quarterly member magazine, Our Generation. 

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