OLD graves should be opened up and reused to make room for some of the 600,000 people who die every year, the Government says.

The plan marks a shift away from the idea that graves should remain undisturbed for ever, and is part of a package of measures to modernise the burial laws.

Paul Goggins, the Home Office Minister, acknowledged that there could be “resistance on cultural and religious grounds” to the reuse of graves, and said that there would be no question of making it compulsory.

“There is pressure on space and so the question is, should we bring in new powers to reuse burial grounds? This is not a massive crisis today but if we don’t look at it in the long term it will become a pressing problem,” he said.

The Government favours “lift and deepen”, a method that involves exhuming any remains left in a grave and reinterring them deeper in the same plot to allow space for new burials on top.

An alternative proposal is to remove remains from existing graves and either put them in ossuaries or cremate them.

The Government has ruled out reuse of graves of historical importance, or where memorials of cultural or heritage value might be damaged.

Laws dating from 1857 make it illegal to disturb bodies without a special licence from the Home Office. About 900 licences are granted a year, mostly to allow people moving to a different part of the country to take the remains of their deceased relations with them. About 40 licences are granted each year to enable commercial developments.

Research has shown that 70 per cent of the public would be in favour of reuse, provided that long enough had lapsed after the first burial. The consultation document suggests that 100 years would be appropriate.

The changes, outlined in a Home Office consultation document, include a proposal for a burial ground inspectorate, responsible for restoring overgrown and decaying cemeteries and maintaining them as safer places for bereaved relatives to visit.

There is also a proposal to place a statutory duty on local authorities to bury or cremate those who have died in their areas. No such obligation now exists and there is no time limit for dealing with the bodies of the deceased.

The proposals come nearly three years after MPs said that recycling long-forgotten graves was the only way to save historic cemeteries from decline. Although 70 per cent of the 600,000 people who die every year are cremated, some cemeteries are already full, with others forced to dig up pathways and shrubberies to create more space.

There was a mixed response to the proposals from religious and secular organisations. Anne Viney, chief executive of the charity Cruse Bereavement Care, said that re-use could lead to more accessible and safer burial sites within local communities.

Steve Jenkins, a Church of England spokesman, said that there was no objection in principle to the reuse of graves — The Churchyards Handbook suggests that reuse can be permitted after 50 years — providing it was handled sensitively.

Iqbal Sacranie, of the Muslim Council of Great Britain, said that while it would be acceptable for new graves to contain several layers, as is the practice already in some parts of the Muslim world, it would be against digging up existing graves.

Melvyn Hertog, head of burials at the United Synagogue of Britain, said that the Orthodox Jewish community would be totally against grave reuse, although it might be acceptable to allow a husband and wife to be buried in the same plot. Jonathan Romaine, a spokesman for the Reform Synagogue of Great Britain, added: “It is a very strong tradition of the Jewish faith that bodies are treated with respect and are not shunted around.”

Keith Wood of the National Secular Society said that he had no objections to the reuse of graves, particularly if cemeteries would consequently be cleaned up and properly maintained. “We are not concerned with people’s immortal souls; we are more concerned with the needs of the living,” he said.

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