Highgate cemetery has axed plans to build a controversial maintenance and toilet block as part of an £18m revamp of the graveyard, after grave owners warned they would exhume the remains of their loved ones if the building went ahead.
Grave owners at the north London cemetery cautiously welcomed the removal of what they called a “bunker” from a planning application that sparked dozens of objections, including from Jeremy Corbyn, the actors Jonathan Pryce and Bertie Carvel, and the widows of the actor Tim Pigott-Smith and the sociologist Stuart Hall.
But they remain suspicious of the management of the cemetery who had insisted during angry meetings that there was no alternative to building the gardeners’ block on a part of the graveyard known as the mound, where almost 200 people were recently buried.
Grave owners fear that dropping the building from the application is just a “ploy” by the Friends of Highgate Cemetery trust (FHCT) to secure £18m of lottery funding for a scheme to redevelop the 36-acre (15-hectare) site. They fear that once the cash is secured the trust will resubmit plans for the contentious building.
In a letter to grave owners sent on Monday, Ian Dungavell, the chief executive of FHCT, insisted that the trust had “listened carefully to the views of grave owners” and “decided to remove the proposed gardeners’ building from our current application”.
He added: “We hope the amended application will now move forward to determination, enabling the vital conservation work to begin. Importantly, consent for the amended application will also help us meet the timing requirements of the National Lottery Heritage Fund, whose support is critical to safeguarding the site’s nature and heritage for the community.”
In response, one of the grave owners, Amir Sanie, an architect, wrote to Dungavell and the cemetery’s trustees asking them to rule out constructing the gardeners’ building on the mound and propose a new site for the facility.
He wrote: “There is a valid concern among some mound grave owners that if you are not able to respond to these simple questions, that the omission of the gardeners’ building from this planning application (at this juncture) is merely a ploy … to secure funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund without the most controversial element of the proposals.”
Mound grave owners are also considering urging the National Heritage Lottery Fund to make the award of any grant conditional on siting the new gardeners’ block on a different area of the site.
Anna Seifert-Speck, a film producer and script editor, whose husband, Simon Speck, a sociologist, is buried on the mound, said: “There is still a deep suspicion that they are mainly doing it to secure the Heritage Lottery funding.”
Seifert-Speck and Pigott-Smith’s widow, the actor Pamela Miles, have both previously threatened to exhume the remains of their husbands if the building went ahead.
Seifert-Speck said: “We are considering an approach to Heritage Lottery to request making the award contingent on an alternative site for the gardeners’ building. The trust has had enough time to clarify where an essential building for the gardeners will go. We are concerned that the acceptance of an unchanged plan removes a lot of the alternative sites for the gardeners’ building and any room for manoeuvre.”
Pigott-Smith’s son, Tom, a violinist, said: “I’m not sure I entirely trust it [the decision to remove the building from the plan] as we know they’re lobbying the planning committee right now about the application and why the alternative locations don’t work, but it’s a minor victory. They [the trust] have spent the last six months saying that they can’t possibly survive without it and snubbing the alternatives.”
Dungevell’s letter explaining why the block had been removed from the plans said: “This decision gives us the opportunity to pause and review the needs and constraints that led to the original proposal for the gardeners’ building. Most importantly, it will allow us to work collaboratively with grave owners and the wider community to find the best way to provide essential gardeners’ facilities.
“We hope this marks the beginning of a fresh conversation between the trust and grave owners, and we are committed to a new programme of consultation. Once we know the outcome of the amended application, we will begin this process and would welcome your ideas on how the dialogue should take shape and how best to stay in touch.”
