A PARISH council has overturned its decision to enable local residents to be buried in a graveyard near their homes in land set aside for non-Christians.

Sowerby Parish Council announced last year that it would give community land to the Church of England to enable the near-capacity graveyard at St Oswald's Church to be extended by up to 240 plots.

Following 18 years of negotiation between landowner and farmer Geoff Bamlett and the then parish council chairman Mark Robson, the council bought the land for £20,000 and built of a surrounding wall for £12,500 using maintenance payments from housing developers.

All parishioners are legally entitled to be buried in the graveyard, but as some residents may object to being buried or having their ashes interred in ground consecrated by the Church of England, it was agreed to leave a section of the extension unconsecrated.

Councilllor Bill Austin, chairman of Sowerby Parish Council, said following negotiations with the church and issues with the water table emerging on the planned unconsecrated section, it had been decided to have all of the new graveyard area consecrated.

He said: “It was felt that it was a church burial ground rather than a cemetery.

“Why would someone want to be buried in a churchyard if they didn’t have any religious convictions?”

Vicar of Sowerby, the Reverend Nicola Carnall said any parishioner, regardless of their faith background, could still be buried in the churchyard.

She said St Oswald’s Parochial Church Council would have preferred to leave a small part of the churchyard extension unconsecrated for a while, in case there were people from the parish – of another faith or of no faith - who would prefer not to be buried in land set aside for Christian burial.

She said: “The church is delighted that there will soon be extra burial space in Sowerby for the benefit of parishioners as space in the current extension is becoming limited.

“The consecration ceremony will be arranged by the Diocese of York when all the legal procedures have been completed.”

Councillor Steve Hoyland, who proposed that part of the graveyard be left unconsecrated, said he had been dismayed by the authority’s decision.

He said: “It seems to me that the parish council is flying in the face of a section of the public in the parish who do want to have unconsecrated land in Sowerby where they can be buried.”