Comment: Back call to cut VAT on headstones

Nov 17 2009 Huddersfield Daily Examiner

FUNERALS often prove to be expensive, especially when so few people set aside money to cover such costs.

So the news that Marsh-based charity The Joseph Salmon Trust is taking on the taxman to stop VAT being charged on headstones is something we should all support.

Under current legislation the cost of burying loved ones is deemed essential and is therefore exempt from VAT.

But headstones are viewed as non-essential so 15% tax has to be paid.

After losing their three-year-old son Joseph to pneumonia in 2005, Neil and Rachael Salmon realised how many parents are unprepared for the cost of saying goodbye to a child so formed the Trust to help others like them.

Many of the people they support need money for a headstone.

The charity does so much to help families in need, but in turn some of the money they raise is taken by the taxman.

A headstone can in no way be compared to other luxuries on which we pay VAT, such as a packet of biscuits.

They are an essential part of grieving – a focal point for people to remember their loved one over time.

Mr and Mrs Salmon have started a petition on the 10 Downing Street website calling for an end to taxing headstones.

And it is something we should all support because it is something that may touch us all one day.