Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, what rules govern the removal of buried bodies to new locations from their lawful place of burial; and how many bodies are currently scheduled to be so moved.

Under section 25 of the Burial Act 1857 (as amended) buried human remains can only be exhumed on the authority of the Secretary of State or under a faculty from the Church of England (in the case of exhumations from consecrated ground). My department receives approximately 25 applications a week to exhume single sets of buried human remains and approximately 8 applications a week to exhume remains for archaeological or development purposes.