News

To mark 100 years since the end of the First World War, Golden Charter is sharing some of the Thank You stories sent to us by members of our network of independent funeral directors.

Items like tea bags, tissues, and daylight savings have become part of our daily life, but we rarely give any thought to their wartime heritage. To thank the First World War’s pioneers and recognise the innovations they made we have compiled a list of five inventions for which conflict was crucial in their development.

Just like the cost of living, the cost of dying can vary greatly depending on your location and research shows huge variations in the prices paid for funerals across the regions of the UK.

According to this year’s ‘Cost of Dying’ report from insurance company SunLife, the overall cost of organising a funeral, wake and administering an estate has risen to over £9,000 for the first time ever.

The way British society relates to death and dying has changed greatly over the last 100 years, with the First World War having a huge impact on attitudes to bereavement and mourning.

Former Changing Rooms presenter Carol Smillie has been training to become a humanist celebrant and recently began conducting humanist funerals.

As we get ready to start the third year of our fundraising partnership, we are delighted to announce that our donations have exceeded £195,000 in support of The Royal British Legion and its sister organisation, Poppyscotland.

We think of grief as a uniquely human emotion, but there are examples of animals experiencing suffering from the loss of a ‘loved one’.

Some people would love to be at their own funeral, as a fly on the wall or to join the party. We’re not at the point where we can attend our own send off, but video technology is helping create the illusion.

Personal memorials are generally low-key. But monuments for some public figures have been designed to dominate the spaces they inhabit.

Each year in May, Dying Matters hosts its awareness week to raise the importance of talking about death, dying and bereavement with our friends, family and loved ones and the 2018 awareness is taking place between the 14th and 20th May.

Direct cremations, when the deceased is collected and taken directly from the place of death to the crematorium without a viewing or funeral service, are becoming more popular.

Up to 40,000 mourning South Africans have attended the funeral service of the anti-apartheid activist, singing and dancing in celebration of her life, her coffin draped in the South African flag.

For as long as human beings have cared for their dead there have been funeral directors, but the profession has evolved through history.

Most forgotten funeral superstitions had an air of the supernatural about them, but often they had incredibly down-to-earth origins.

Babies born today will live, on average, until their 90th birthday and beyond. Use the life expectancy calculator from the ONS to work out how long you are likely to live.

A minority of people in Britain – just 6% - enjoy the peace of mind that a funeral plan can bring. Are people in other countries any better at end-of-life planning that we are in Britain?