Bereavement

John Hayes Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Grahame Morris]

I completely agree with that, and I want to develop those arguments.

[Sir John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)]

rose—

[Grahame Morris]

I am willing to take one more intervention, but I want the Minister to have time to respond. I give way to the right hon. Gentleman.

[Sir John Hayes]

I wanted the hon. Gentleman to get all his interventions in at once, so his flow can continue. He will know that I am chairman of the all-party parliamentary group for funerals and bereavement. I wonder if he could add to his list of demands for the Minister the provision of vaccinations and personal protective equipment for frontline funeral staff, and a clearer line about the policing of funerals. There are some suggestions that funeral directors are being held liable for enforcing sensible rules on funerals. We need greater clarity on that, too, and I am very grateful to him for giving me the opportunity to make those points.

[Grahame Morris]

As always, the right hon. Gentleman makes eminently sensible points born out of his experience with the all-party group. The three suggestions or demands that I have put forward are those that are identified by the three charities I mentioned earlier, but certainly personally I do agree with him on vaccination, funeral arrangements and so on.

I would like to ask the Minister to look at the issue of cross-governmental co-ordination and improved focus on these issues. I understand that the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire (Ms Dorries) is often identified as the Minister for bereavement. I am delighted that we have the hon. Member for Sutton and Cheam (Paul Scully) as the Minister today, but we certainly need a clear ministerial lead on bereavement to ensure there is proper co-ordination on the issues raised by the right hon. Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) and others. Otherwise, bereaved families will continue to slip through the net and be passed from pillar to post, which is distressing and frustrating.

A bereavement standard would benefit business and the bereaved by providing a clear, concise and consistent process to close accounts when a loved one dies. A bereavement standard would establish, first, an agreed timeframe for companies to respond to bereavement enquiries and settle outstanding customer balances. Members will be aware that the existing arrangements, the Tell Us Once service to which the hon. Member for North East Fife (Wendy Chamberlain) referred, applies only to the public sector, and not to private companies, utilities and banks. Secondly, a bereavement standard would establish a dedicated bereavement customer care direct email channel for each company to handle such cases and avoid customers waiting on calls. Thirdly, it would establish the standardisation of paperwork needed to close an account, with a view to accepting—this is a really important point in the age we live in—digital documents wherever possible.

I anticipate that the Minister will, in his reply, refer to the excellent bereavement standard that already exists in the public sector. The Tell Us Once service is working well, ensuring that bereaved people do not have to go through the trauma of telling every single Government Department that they have lost a loved one, but we need exactly the same in the private sector to cover banks, utilities, insurance companies and more: a standard process across all organisations and companies, with specifically trained staff dealing with bereavement and an agreed timescale to close accounts and resolve issues. There is nothing more distressing than when such inquiries drag on for months and months.

At one of the most challenging times in life, I hope we all agree—this is a cross-party issue; I am not seeking to make a party political point here—that families should not have to spend hours going back and forth with companies, waiting months to close an account. Research from Settld and Cruse Bereavement Care shows that the vast majority of bereaved people described the administration processes as time-consuming and stressful. A quarter found it traumatic, especially having to phone so many individual companies and repeat time and again, “My husband/wife/father/mother has died.”

The single most important action the Government can take to support families would be to introduce a digital death certificate. This would enable families to close accounts quickly, initiate probate and engage specialist services such as Settld to deal with the administration following a death. When asked to introduce digital death certificates, in a written response, a Home Office Minister responded:

“There is currently no provision in law to issue a death certificate other than in a paper format.”

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir John Hayes]

Part of the issue is that too many services have gone online, which is to some degree a consequence of the current crisis. We need to encourage such businesses and agencies, particularly when they are dealing with older people, to have face-to-face or phone-to-phone contact. As far as e-government is concerned, we want more p-government, where p stands for people.

[Paul Scully]

My right hon. Friend talks about people, and people are at the heart of any business, service or organisation. Whether it is e or p, we cannot lose the personal.

This is exactly the kind of work that I want to continue with our regulators and sponsor Departments, to make sure that we can raise these issues, develop our understanding and put in any necessary action to support businesses in delivering the caring, simple processes that bereaved people need. I assure the hon. Member for Easington that improving outcomes for bereaved consumers remains a priority for Government.

As well as talking about the standard, the hon. Gentleman spoke about digital copies of death certification, and clarity for business and consumers to allow the markets to function more effectively. The Government are working with regulators to understand what we can do to provide more clarity and confidence for firms on the use of digital copies of death certificates. For the record, and to avoid conflating concepts, it should be noted that digital death certificates do not exist; digital copies of death certification refer to the scanned copies of documents.

The hon. Gentleman also talked about bereavement leave. I hope that with me, he will welcome Jack’s law, which came into force last year, on parental bereavement leave and pay. It is a good start. I know that he wants to go further, but we should bear in mind that this is a statutory minimum. When we look at workers’ protections and workers’ rights, which have been the subject of debate over the last few weeks, we see that all these things are statutory minimums. As a former employer who has run businesses, I know that doing the bare minimum is not good business practice; we invest in our people. We will always ask employers to go further.

The Government are working to better understand what issues and problems bereaved consumers persistently face in the essential service sectors. We support and value the good work that the regulators in those sectors have done and are doing on these issues, and we know that many businesses already offer bereaved customers both compassion and efficient service.

We remain committed to improving outcomes for all consumers experiencing vulnerability, including those facing bereavement, and we will continue to work through the issues that the hon. Member has raised and carefully consider his suggestions. We encourage all businesses to treat all consumers with compassion and understanding, particularly when those consumers are faced with emotional hardship, and we thank those that are already doing exactly that.

I thank the hon. Member once again for his contribution to the debate. I also thank the other hon. and right hon. Members who intervened and contributed, and everyone who continues to work hard to raise awareness of issues facing consumers dealing with bereavement and loss.

Question put and agreed to.