Nadia Mitsopoulos: Now our cemeteries are running out of space, because, well, there’s just more of us these days, it’s as simple as that. And, in fact, Australia’s annual death count has more than doubled since 1960, and it will double again by around 2070. So what does that mean for how we are all laid to rest in the future? Well, I’ve got Kathlene Oliver with me. She’s the CEO of the Metropolitan Cemeteries Board to talk about the future of our cemeteries. And thank you so much for coming in. Good to meet you.
Kathlene Oliver: Thank you very much, Nadia [indistinct] opportunity.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: So how many cemeteries do we have in WA, and who owns what?
Kathlene Oliver: So we have over 560 cemeteries in Western Australia. They’re a mix of ownership. There are some private cemeteries which are family owned. But the majority are public. So we have, obviously, the Metropolitan Cemeteries Board, we look after the seven cemeteries here in the metropolitan region. And then we have cemetery boards in Kalgoorlie, Geraldton, Albany and Bunbury. And the rest of the cemeteries that are public are vested with the local governments and shires to look after.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: And most of those you were saying are open public cemeteries. And then, when we talk about plots, are they forever?
Kathlene Oliver: No, they’re not. So here in Western Australia, our tenure is 25 years plus 25 years. And if at any time during that first 25 years of tenure the family apply to the board for an extension, that’s automatically granted. So, effectively, it resets so there’s 75 years of tenure.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: And then, after that?
Kathlene Oliver: They can apply again.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: So you can just keep applying for 25-year tenures…
Kathlene Oliver: Yeah.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: …for as long as you want? The families can run through generations?
Kathlene Oliver: They can. Obviously, we need to balance that with the demand for space, as you’ve commented that there is a shortage of space that will be coming with the increase in deaths that are occurring. So we do need to manage the expectations and whether or not we can grant extending tenure beyond 75 years.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: So in what circumstances would somebody be refused?
Kathlene Oliver: Well, it would come down to whether or not we’re running out of space. So, we want to be able to offer people the opportunity to be buried alongside their forefathers, in which case then we need to provide the opportunity for further development of that site. And in that case, we don’t remove any of the interred remains. They stay in place and we put new graves in between existing graves and in footpaths and utilise space that was not used originally when the cemetery was first established.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: ’Cause you have a renewal program, don’t you?
Kathlene Oliver: We do, which we’re doing at Karrakatta.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: And there’s often concern about that. I know when it’s come to certain veterans, that some war graves, had been, there’s paths over them. I mean, I know that’s been a point of contention for some time. So I’m just wondering how do you manage that?
Kathlene Oliver: So we now have in place an agreement with the Office of Australian War Graves and the RSL to retain all war graves. So they will not be renewed in the future. Some of the early occurrences of cemetery renewal, there were some graves renewed. We’re working with both of those parties to re-establish the graves. So there are limitations with that, but we’re doing what we can to make right the issues of the past.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Okay. ’Cause it becomes a very emotional issue for families?
Kathlene Oliver: Yes. And that’s why now any war veteran has perpetual tenure under our agreement with the Office of Australian War Graves. We will not renew their graves in the future.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: And I just want to be clear. You talked about, you know, it’s important for families to have contact with you and apply for another 25 years’ tenure for a plot. Do you come to them when that 25 years is up? Or is it up to them to keep track of it and come to you? So, for instance, my father’s plot, right, I think we’re at 22 years now. If I don’t come to you in the next three years, is there a chance that that will be removed?
Kathlene Oliver: No. Look, we would attempt to make contact before we do any renewal. So we put out signs at each of those graves for a 12-month period alerting people that that area is due for renewal. And then, we will try to contact you. The issue we do have, though, is, in some cases, the contact details we have is for the former grant holder who has since passed. So unless the family are keeping us up to date, we can attempt to contact, but we just cannot make that contact. So we do put up notices in newspapers, we put signs up around, we put a sign on every grave that is earmarked for renewal, and we ask that the family make contact with us.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Kathlene Oliver’s my guest this morning. She’s the CEO of the Metropolitan Cemeteries Board. I’ve got some good questions coming in on the text and I will absolutely ask them of you. Traditional burials, are they waning in popularity?
Kathlene Oliver: No, we’re finding that they’re fairly stable. We are seeing a growth in the number of cremations. So here in Western Australia, over 80 per cent of people opt for cremation over burial. But there are certain religious groups and cultural groups that have a religious decree where they are required to be buried. So there’s always going to be a demand for burial. Last year, in the last financial year, we undertook 2,420 burials, and 10,952 cremations.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: What about natural burials? I hear this a bit, and it’s to do with people being a little bit more sustainable and trying to reduce their carbon footprint, if you like.
Kathlene Oliver: Yes. So natural burials are something that we do offer. It hasn’t taken off in the popularity that we thought it would, and I think part of the reason for that is that, when the person whose wish is to go into a natural burial has passed, it’s a step too far for the family.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: What is that exactly?
Kathlene Oliver: So a natural burial is that you’re placed in an unmarked grave, and we allow the vegetation to rehabilitate over the top of the grave. So you don’t have a traditional headstone or marker to go to. The family know which area the burial is in, but may not be able to go back to the actual grave themselves in the future. So we have usually it’s a rock outside of the burial area where you can put a plaque to say that your loved one is buried in there. But the fact that they can’t guarantee they’ll be able to relocate their loved one’s grave. We can take them to a grave if they would like, and if they’re concerned. But I think that’s caused a bit of a disconnect for some families to be able to actually follow through on that request.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: And these are in bush areas around Perth?
Kathlene Oliver: No. We offer them in our cemeteries. So Fremantle Cemetery has a natural burial area and, since we’ve opened that, which was in 2010, we’ve had 92 burials in that area. And then, we have a natural burial area at Pinnaroo Valley Memorial Park, and we’ve had 32 burials within that space.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Now, Julie and Peter have called in about this, and I’ve got lots of texts simply asking like this one from Annie, “how about planting people vertically?”
Kathlene Oliver: Look, it’s something that we may need to consider in the future. At the moment, it’s not actually going to save a great deal of space, because, in order to dig down deep enough to have them under the ground surface…
Nadia Mitsopoulos: You’re standing up?
Kathlene Oliver: You’re standing up.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: It’s a bit morbid talking about this, but…
Kathlene Oliver: It is.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: …it’s effectively how they’d be buried, right?
Kathlene Oliver: That’s correct. So if you’re 6 ft tall, we’ve got to dig down that far to get you in, which makes it very difficult from a logistical perspective. I’m not sure in the end it actually saves that much space.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Do other cities do this, though?
Kathlene Oliver: Some cities are doing this now, yes. Other countries, they’ll also only allow burials for a certain period of time and then they’ll exhume, and then they’ll reuse the land because they’ve got limited space. Now, obviously, we in Australia don’t have that challenge, thank goodness, but there’s a lot of vertical cemeteries where they’re above-ground entombments and those ones are multi-storey or on sides of hills. Brazil have a number of them, and Israel, Singapore have some as well.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Are these people, though, that are cremated, that go into those?
Kathlene Oliver: No. They’re going in in a natural. So, particularly, if you think about the Jewish, part of their religious decree is that they need to be in contact with the earth, but they have major space limitations. So where they do vertical burials, they put soil in the crypt and then they have a pipe that has got soil linking all of the crypts so, effectively, bringing everybody back down in contact with the earth. And it is a modern way to approach that challenge because everyone needs to be buried under the Jewish faith, and they’re running out of space, they’ve got significant issues. And interesting you were mentioning at the start, at the introduction, if the burial rate stays the same globally through to 2050 as it is today, the world would require an area that is six times the size of New York City in order to host all of those burials.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: What?
Kathlene Oliver: So it is a real challenge, and we are seeing a lot of countries are moving towards a preference for cremation.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Cremation. Are you seeing more people wanting to be cremated?
Kathlene Oliver: Yes. As I say, here in Western Australia, we are probably one of the most progressive in that regard with over 80 per cent of people opting for cremation. Across the rest of Australia it’s only 60 per cent that opt for cremation.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Why are we different here?
Kathlene Oliver: We’re trying to understand that. So, yes, so, we’re undertaking some market research, and we’d really love to get your viewers’ input. So if anybody’s interested in participating, if they visit our website, which is mcb.wa.gov.au, you’ll see there’s a link for a community survey, and we really want to understand why people believe we’re moving into the directions that we’re heading. For us to be able to plan ahead for a cemetery, we like to hold five years’ worth of graves available for future use. That’s our comfort zone. But we need to be acquiring future land and starting to develop that for that longer-term need. But we want to try and understand whether the demand will be the same now in ten years as it is today.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: A lot of people are texting saying they’ve got a decent digger that could help you with these vertical cemeteries. People quite like the idea, I’ve got to say. Well, get online and fill out the survey!
Kathlene Oliver: Exactly.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: That’s what Kathlene would like you to do. When will you run out of room, then? Have you got calculations on that?
Kathlene Oliver: I do. Look, we have across a number of the cemeteries, so we’ve got the seven cemeteries here in Perth. Midland and Guildford are our cemeteries that are coming the closest to full capacity. So we’ve got approximately fifteen years’ worth of stock there based on the current level of burials that are occurring at those cemeteries. Guildford is very popular with our Muslim and Jewish communities, we’ve set aside specific areas for them there that meet their cultural requirements. Then, we have Fremantle and Karrakatta, they’re approximately 30 years away. 50 years for Pinnaroo, and 90 years for our newest cemetery, the Rockingham Regional Memorial Park. Now, they’re our best estimates based on assumptions that burial rates will stay the same as they are today.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Because you’ll eventually run out of room. You can’t just keep…
Kathlene Oliver: That’s right.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: …you know, your suburban sprawl, and just keep going “okay, I’ll take this massive plot of land now and turn that into a cemetery”. You can’t really do that, can you?
Kathlene Oliver: No, we can’t do that. And we have limitations. So, obviously, Karrakatta is constrained, there is no further opportunity to expand at Karrakatta. Fremantle, similarly, there’s not a lot of opportunity for expansion. We have some land that we are yet to develop that will provide that future growth there. But Midland and Guildford, also, we’re restricted by Bush Forever land which surrounds the sites.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Now, these are legitimate questions coming through on the text. Underwater burial sites. Is that a thing?
Kathlene Oliver: It is a thing. It’s not something that we’re currently offering here in Western Australia. So some of the newer techniques, we have a limitation in the legislative frameworks that we have. But things like aquamation, which is using water instead of flame for cremation, that is growing in popularity in the US, but we cannot offer it here in Australia at the moment. But it is something that we’re looking to expand our offering into if the demand is here.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Now, what about digital cemeteries? I’ve read about this. Is it really something people would be into?
Kathlene Oliver: Well, again, this is what we’d really like to know from your listeners.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Yeah.
Kathlene Oliver: Because, in China, it is becoming quite popular. So they have a virtual cemetery where you can go and visit the headstone and the grave of your loved one from anywhere in the world. So there is some real merit to that if it helps people feel connected to their loved one.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: But where’s the actual body?
Kathlene Oliver: The body is in situ in the cemetery and there is a headstone. But you can log on and you can do a virtual tour through AI technology to visit that grave. There’s also technologies that are emerging which we can offer where you can put a chip in a plaque and then you can actually link that to a digital memorial, which may have, you could choose to, say, show the video of the funeral service, or a compilation of the life of that person through photos, and people can learn more about that individual through a link to a digital memorial.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Because there is a social history attached with cemeteries, and I suppose you don’t want to lose that if we start to move away from traditional burials.
Kathlene Oliver: Yes. Well, it’s an interesting point too, Nadia, because we are now in a time in history where we don’t know where all of the deceased people reside.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Yeah.
Kathlene Oliver: Because, with cremation, families are taking ashes home and are choosing to memorialise their loved ones away from the cemetery environment. And, as a result of that, we’ve lost that historical record of where that person’s last resting place is…
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Yeah.
Kathlene Oliver: …and it’s an interesting time. I don’t know if it’s a problem. But we’ve not had this before. We’ve always known where every citizen who’s passed’s final resting place.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: Get online and do the survey. Just quickly, 30 seconds left, how would you like to be laid to rest?
Kathlene Oliver: I’m going to be cremated. I’ve actually already purchased my space at Karrakatta. I bought a granite bench, which I’ve put a memorial for my mother and my grandmother. And, then, my twin sister and I are going to go in under the bench cremated with our remains.
Nadia Mitsopoulos: A very nice family affair. And then the family can come and sit on you and think about you!
Kathlene Oliver: Exactly. [Laughs]
Nadia Mitsopoulos: [Laughs] Thank you so much. Great discussion. Thank you so much for coming in, I appreciate it. And don’t forget, go to the website, do the survey, they want your feedback. Kathlene Oliver, the CEO of the Metropolitan Cemeteries Board. Thank you. That was interesting. And your texts, I’ll get to them after 10 o’clock. Look, thank you very much those of you who quite like the idea of vertical cemeteries where you’re all buried standing up. What do you think about that? “Did the pandemic require more gravesites?” Didn’t ask, but good question, Sandy, thank you.
Disclaimer: While all care has been taken to ensure this transcript is accurate, the Saving Family Headstones at Karrakatta admin team does not make any guarantees about its accuracy, nor takes any responsibility for issues that may arise. You may access the original interview audio for your own reference.