New laws planned to tackle rogue funeral firms

There's a grim irony in the fact that it often takes a scandal to prompt the state to act on the most basic of consumer protections. Robert Bush's case—a funeral director who betrayed the trust of grieving families—was stomach-churning, but the response from Westminster has been characteristically slow and reactive. The government now says it will legislate, but the question is whether these new rules will have teeth or merely offer the appearance of oversight. The funeral sector has long been a patchwork of self-regulation, where the worst-case scenario for a bad actor was a slap on the wrist from a trade body that lacked real enforcement power. That simply isn't good enough when you're dealing with people at their most vulnerable. Grieving families shouldn't have to act as their own regulators, checking whether a funeral home is fit to handle a loved one's remains. The state has a duty here, and it's been negligent in fulfilling it. That said, we should be cautious about overpromising. Regulation is only as good as its enforcement, and we've seen countless examples across other industries—from care homes to financial services—where rules exist on paper but are rarely applied in practice. The government needs to fund the regulator properly, give it real investigatory powers, and ensure that penalties are severe enough to deter misconduct. A few new clauses in a bill won't change the culture of an industry overnight. Ultimately, this is about restoring trust in a profession that most people only encounter a handful of times in their lives. The public deserves better than to wonder if the person handling their mother's funeral is doing so with dignity and legality. If these new laws are done right, they could be a genuine step forward. If they're done cheaply and half-heartedly, they'll be another piece of legislative theatre—and the next Robert Bush will slip through the cracks again.