Community can play role in affordable Funerals for Tasmanians
IT is said that only two things are certain in life — death and taxes. We often talk about taxes so why not death? Death, after all, is the natural conclusion of life.
In September 2020, Australia’s population was 25,693,059. Population loss for the preceding year was 0.02 per cent because fewer people migrated.
Yet a much larger number of Australians also died that year. In 2019, for example, 169,201 Australians died. Of these deaths, 4663 occurred in Tasmania. Tasmanians are older, sicker and poorer than the rest of Australia.
Significant numbers live below the poverty line and are reliant on government payments to survive. We die younger and in poorer circumstances.
The process of burying someone in Australia is increasingly performed by funeral parlours. In less than a century, we have gone from mourning our loved ones by holding vigils, performing last rites and preparing a body for death in our homes to totally outsourcing these activities to the funeral industry.
Participating fully in these final activities can be an enriching, life-affirming and healing experience that comes from a place of love.
Still, we consider funeral home employees to be experts in death and dying. While we consider funeral homes to be local family-owned and run businesses, few actually are. About 80 per cent of funeral homes, coffin suppliers, last rite officiates and funeral service providers in Australia are affiliated with just three internationally owned companies. Death is big business.
We all want to send our loved ones off “in style”, but in reality few of us can afford to. A basic funeral with the cheapest coffin (about $2000) will cost $8000. It is a large, sudden cost often required within a short period of time, during a period of great distress when clarity may be lacking. Community owned and run funerals can assist and offer funeral services at about a third of the cost of a traditional funeral.
When you die, someone will find your body. In many cases, it is a close friend or family member. If you are that person, take time to grieve. It may be the last time you will be alone with that person. As soon as the police, doctor or any outside organisation is called, control can be lost.
It is from this point that you need to know what the person wanted in death (cremation, natural burial or a plot).
Funerals are very expensive. They don’t have to be, say Lynne Jarvis and Erika Altmann
Sometimes a communitybased burial is the only way in which cultural and religious needs can be met.
Community-based funeral movements work towards reclaiming the rites around death and dying. They offer education about rights and responsibilities and the opportunity for open conversation by empowering people to take control of their dying, their deaths and their funerals. They promote individual healing in death for the person and those who remain by making the burial processes transparent, treating people and their families as unique individuals in death.
Tender Funerals is a community owned, not-forprofit organisation in the process of setting up in Tasmania under local charity Care Beyond Cure. Tender Funerals offers funeral services that deliver personalised, meaningful and affordable funerals that do not leave community members with large debt, and put people and relationships first.
When fully operational, Tender Funerals will offer help with navigating processes, ceremonial body preparation for burial or cremation, mortuary services, funeral transport for the body, a place to sit and be with your loved one in death, low-cost coffins, help with organising body disposal, medical paperwork and registration of office death certificates with governmental offices.
Importantly, with Tender Funerals people only pay for the services they require.
For a community venture to succeed, it must have the backing of a community. Through Tender Funerals Tasmania’s current crowdfunding campaign, everyone has the opportunity to “buy in” and contribute. Donations over $2 are tax deductible.