Funeral home CEO calls for industry regulation

PAINTING a picture of an unregulated and disorganised funeral industry, CEO of the Belgroves Group of Companies Keith Belgrove has appealed for the Funeral Homes Bill to be brought to the Parliament.

He said it must be given priority and support, as public health could be at risk.

Belgrove said both the office of the Attorney General and the Ministry of Rural Development and Local Government have pledged their support, but without prioritisation they have made no advance.

Belgrove said 50 years after joining the profession, the funeral service is in a worse condition than when he met it. When he joined the business in 1968, he said, there were 18 funeral agencies and while that number has tripled in 2018, nothing else has changed.

“The industry was unregulated then. There was an utter lack of integrity among funeral homes, and there were physical fights between undertakers over a job. As you will expect, where competition was ugly, prices were depressed. The disgraceful practice of touting for funerals at all hospitals was quite common.”

Today, he said, there are 54 funeral homes and counting, "and while we call ourselves funeral directors, we are still disorganised, still unregulated, still utterly lacking integrity among funeral homes, there are still physical fights between undertakers over a job, with competition still ugly, prices are still depressed. The despicable practice of touting for funerals at all hospitals is still quite common. We were unregulated then and we are still unregulated today.”

Against this backdrop he called for the industry to be regulated on Thursday night, as he was presented with the key to the city by San Fernando Mayor Junia Regrello for his outstanding service and that of his ancestors for the past 130 years.

“How can we participate in developing our country into first world status without our industry being regulated?” Belgrove asked as he advocated for the Funeral Homes Bill to be prioritised, enacted and assented to.

“Without regulations in funeral service we are failing the bereaved, risking our public health every day. We must learn from the Sierra Leone Ebola experience. The funeral practices of that culture was the main cause of the outbreak becoming an epidemic.

“How can we in funeral service support the objective of first-world status without licensing laws to efficiently govern the creation of a true and noble funeral profession?”

Apart from the licencing laws, Belgrove is also pushing for government to adopt a voluntary national code for funeral services.

Belgrove said the Association of Funeral Professional of TT, which he led, and which comprised Raw Wight, the late Shaun Jodhan and Davy Simpson, worked closely with the Bureau of Standards (TTBS) in the development of the voluntary standards for funeral services.

“We were advised by the TTBS that all government agencies should adopt the minimum standards in their interactions with any funeral homes. Sadly, this has not happened. This code is completely ignored by most players in this industry,” he said.

CEO of the San Fernando City Corporation Indarjit Singh told Belgrove the city will adopt the code.