§ Mr. Harry Greenway (Ealing, North)With your permission, Mr. Speaker, and that of the House, I beg leave to present a petition from Ernest Alfred Charles Gooch, a retired accountant, male nurse and constituent of mine, of 138 Wadham Gardens, Greenford, Middlesex:
To the Honourable the Commons of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in Parliament assembled. The humble Petition of Ernest Alfred Charles Gooch sheweth.That the right and duty to choose the means of disposal of the body of a deceased person rests in law with the executor of the will.That your Petitioner's wishes as next of kin were not followed by the state as executor of his late son's will and that his son's body was cremated rather than interred. Wherefore your Petitioner prays that your Honourable House will pass legislation to grant the next of kin full freedom of choice over the means of disposal of deceased person's body.And your Petitioner, as in duty bound, will ever pray, etc.I have received 2,526 signatures in support of Mr. Gooch's petition, which I commend to the House.Mr. Gooch lost his son last year. He wished to bury him in the grave of his first wife, as she had wished and as he knew his son had wished. He was prevented from doing this by the law as it stands, which provides that the executor of the deceased person's will shall have the right to dispose of the deceased's body as he thinks fit regardless, if necessary, of the wishes of the next of kin.
This seems to me to be a very sad and unsatisfactory state of affairs. It has caused great sadness to my constituent, Mr. Gooch, and I humbly beg the House to do all it can in support of his petition.
§ To lie upon the Table.