Three Fife cemeteries have fallen into a state of “disrepair”, according to Councillor George Kay.
Mr Kay has called on urgent maintenance to be undertaken at burial sites at Auchtertool, Burntisland and Kinghorn after receiving complaints from residents.
Fife Council, who maintain the three sites, insist that work to bring them back up to standard is under way, with maintenance teams set to be working to rectify any problems.
However, Mr Kay is angry that the cemeteries have been allowed to get into such a state and has called on more to be done to make them presentable.
“It started in Auchtertool when somebody phoned to complain about the state of the cemetery,” he said.
“Then, completely unrelated, I got a call that afternoon from somebody in Burntisland saying the same thing about the cemetery there. I went to all three in my ward and was shocked at the state of disrepair.
“The cemeteries are being neglected. I was in Auchtertool last week and it is quite clear that nothing has been cut all year.
“Growth has been slow this year. Usually around mid-May I start to receive calls from people about verges that are needing cut but that has not happened as much.
“Everything is certainly growing now though. Standards have to be set and they have to be maintained.”
Mr Kay said there is clear evidence to suggest that grass had not been cut this year on his visits to the graveyards, while weeding and landscaping work has not been undertaken.
“There was a rain barrel that wasn’t connected to anything so people wanting water couldn’t get any,” he added.
“There are a lot of things that are not right. I have been told that there have been cutbacks but I didn’t expect the impact to be as much as it has been.”
Fife Council bereavement services officer William Greig admitted that a number of events had impacted on maintenance schedules this year. Apologising for any upset this has caused, he said that work at all of the burial sites was back on track.
“The planned maintenance schedule is programmed for all cemeteries Fife-wide on a 14-day cycle (10 working days),” he said.
“Normally this is achievable for the cemetery staff who are based at various depots throughout Fife and who are maintaining and carrying out burials in over 117 cemeteries throughout the kingdom.
“A number of variables impacted on this team’s workload and caused a decline in the normal standard of maintenance being carried out.
“The number of burials being carried out by the squad took a sudden increase and this was compounded by the breakdown of the two large grass cutting machines we use in these cemeteries.
“Bereavement services covered these breakdowns by transferring resources from other areas, and hopefully have now got back on track with the problem areas.
“We would like to apologise for any upset and distress this has caused to family members when tending to relatives’ graves, and have been putting all available resources into solving these issues and will continue to monitor the situation to avoid any repeat of the current situation.”
Many of Fife’s cemeteries are already close to capacity. Earlier this year The Courier reported that graveyards at Kinghorn, West Wemyss, Cardenden, Leven and St Andrews are almost out of spare plots.
Photo by David Wardle