Burial Board Committee – Consecration Again

March 1895

Mexborough and Swinton Times March 1, 1895

Burial Board Committee
Consecration Again

The Burial Board Committee of the Parish Council, met on Wednesday night, Mr S Whitefield presiding. Messrs. Ogley, Jones, Senior, Norwood, Gllott, Robinson, Sharp, Marsh, Booth and Taylor were also present.

Burial Board Accounts

The Clerk read the accounts of the burial board for 1894, showing;

Income from fees £105.15s 3d precept on overseers £160 total revenue, £265.15s 3d. Balance due to bank at end of the year £169 7s 8d., making a total of £435 2s 11d.

The expenditure showed balance due at commencement of 1894, £162 8s 1d; salaries etc £99 8s 4d; repayment of loans £170 12s 7d; outlay for printing, petty cash, bank commission, grave stays, cemetery seats, et cetera, £46 8s 11d which with £17.19s made a total to correspond to the other side of £435 2s 11d.

The balance remaining due on loans was £3036 18 s.

The chairman referring to the balance due to the bank stated that overseers had paid in a precept of £160 leaving about 9 pound due. They would notice a charge for bank commission, but if they incurred anything in the way of interest, the auditor would not pass it, and some of them would become personally liable for it. The question was how were they to avoid it.

Eventually it was decided, on the motion of Mr Sharp, that Mr Hawksworth furnish the council with an approximate estimate of how much a 2d rate would produce, and that the council be requested at its next meeting to issue a precept for that amount.

Miscellaneous

Two grants for grave spaces were signed, and cheques for £13 19s 7d, authorised to be drawn.

The Old Board Room

The chairman raised the question as to what was to be done with the old board room at the cemetery

Mr Norwood: That the caretaker have it as part of his house

Mr Booth: He says it is no use to him. He can’t get into it without going into the open air

Mr. Ogley: Can’t the door be made into from his house

Mr F. Booth: No, not as the house is built. It was suggested that it should be converted into a vestry, for the use of the clergymen when signing the register.

Mr Taylor: Will it do for both parties to sign in if it is?

The Chairman: That’s an important question

Mr Sharp: It is a very knotty one too. It’s a pity a consecrationist should have to walk on the same footpath as anyone else

Mr F. Booth: It is (laughter)

Eventually it was decided to leave the question as to what use be made of the room for the consideration of the next meeting.

The Consecration Question.

Mr Norwood said he would like to know what it was intended to do with regard to calling a parish meeting to consider that alteration of the chapel.

The Chairman: I want to know what you are going to do

Mr Norwood: Is not for us to decide but for the whole council

The Chairman: No, it is your scheme

Mr Norwood: A majority of the council had decided in favour of the chapel, and it is a duty of the council to take steps to give effect to their resolution.

Mr Jones: I move that we employ an architect to prepare plans

The Chairman: I can’t accept the resolution

Mr Sharp: quite right, we can’t do it and I warn any councillor against signing any checking connection with the matter until the parish has given its consent

Mr F. Jones: I think I can move this resolution

The Chairman: I certainly cannot accept it

Mr Sharp: The proper course for you to take

The Chairman: Let them find it out, Mr Sharp, it is their scheme. (laughter)

Mr Sharp: Nothing can be done before a parish meeting

Mr Norwood: Then it is the duty of the council to call one and to go before it properly prepared

Mr Sharp,: If you want to call a parish meeting, you can do it

Chairman: Why not call a parish meeting yourselves?

Mr Norwood: Because I contend that this council having passed the resolution, it is a duty of the council to go to the parish prepared to ask for it to be carried out

Mr Marsh: why don’t you go to the parish?

Mr Gillott: What is a good of going without an estimate?

Mr Marsh: The majority of the council agreed to the resolution without an estimate.

Mr Sharp: And they might just as well have agreed to the alteration of the moon. (Laughter)

Mr Marsh: Why not ask a parish meeting to pass the resolution without an estimate

Chairman: Well, if the parish council goes to the parish without an estimate it will make the position more ridiculous than ever.

Mr Jones: Then will you accept my resolution?

Chairman: Let me have it then. I will accept anything to get on, only let me have it in writing.

Mr Robinson: Who is going to pay the Architect if the parish refuses it?

Mr Jones: This council.

Mr Robinson: Oh, will they?

Mr. Jones after some delay then presented a written resolution as follows – “I move that an architect be employed to alter the chapel into 2 parts.”

Mr Norwood: What about enlarging it?

Mr Sharp: I shall object to that resolution. We have no right to employing architect to alter the chapel. That is going further even than preparing plans.

The Chairman: I can’t accept this resolution, it is too ambiguous, write it out afresh.

Mr Jones: why can’t you take it without writing it. Plenty of other resolutions are moved without being written.

The Chairman: Yes but not on such important subjects as this

Mr Jones, after a further delay, handed in another resolution, as follows: – “I move that the council employ an architect to prepare plans to enlarge and alter it and submit to the parish “meeting”

The Chairman: This is worse still. Alter “it”- what “it” (loud laughter)

Mr Jones: The chapel

The Chairman: Well then, you say nothing about estimates and that is the most important part of it. Try again, see what you can make a bit next time. (Renewed laughter)

Mr Jones: I didn’t see the need of all this. It’s simple enough without having it in writing

The Chairman: I shall decline to accept any resolution until it is in writing

Mr Jones made another attempt, and while he was waiting Mr. Taylor said: it’s hardly good enough to laugh at them and just because he doesn’t happen to be as good as scholars some of us are. (Hear, hear)

Mr. Sharp: if you are alluding to me, mister. Taylor, I must say that I was not laughing for that reason. I would be the last man in the world to laugh at another one of education. I would far sooner help Mr Jones to write out his resolution

Mr.Jones ultimately handed in the third resolution, as follows: – “I move that the council employ an architect to make an estimate for the alteration of the chapel.”

The Chairman: This is something nearer, and just to help you, Mr Jones, I will add to it: “to submit the same to the parish meeting.”

Mr Norwood: Then it does not include the enlargement.

Mr F. Marsh: and what about the plans, ought not the parish to have some ideas of what sort of the building you are going to make?

The Chairman: Decidedly.

Mr. Dallow, the Mexborough and Swinton Times reporter, at this juncture helped Mr. Jones out of his difficulty by handing him the following draftresolution: “I move that an architect be instructed to prepare plans and estimate for the enlargement and reconstruction of the cemetery chapel, and that the same be submitted to a parish meeting in accordance with the resolution passed by the council.”

Mr Jones signed this and handed it in.

The Chairman: This is something like, is this Mr Booths (laughter) I will accept this with the addition of the date of the resolution – and I second it –

Mr Sharp: I submit that the council has no power to incur any expenditure in the matter at all. It is quite in the power of any member to call a meeting of the parish, and that, I submit, is a proper way for anyone to proceed he wants a meeting for any purpose. If we have no power to spend the money on the chapel we have no power to consult an architect. In my opinion the auditor will object to pass any such item as not in conformity with law. I again warn any councillor against signing cheques and I promise them that the auditor shall be made fully aware of all the circumstances. The whole matter is an attempt to force expenditure upon the parish for the convenience of church people alone, and I think it is a very great pity if they are going to put the parish to the expense of altering the chapel that they cannot go to the parish meeting with proper plans and estimates of their own. I submit you took the proper course at first Mr Chairman when you declined to accept such a resolution.

The Chairman: I endorse what Mr Sharp says that it does seem somewhat irregular to propose to spend money on a thing we can’t see our way to accomplish. On the other hand I have doubts whether Mr Sharp is right or not. The Parish Council have decided for a second chapel and by comparaitive reasoning they can spend money to accomplish the object so far as getting plans passed. I believe the Parish Council should be advocating for Urban control, the adoptive acts or in fighting actions, spend money and I believe the council would be justified in paying for these plans, as it is only a means towards carrying out something for a public purpose.

Mr Marsh: We have only the same powers that their burial board have had

The Chairman: How can any large enterprise be provided for without this sort of thing

Mr. Marsh: By getting the consent of the parish meeting in the first instance.

Mr Sharp: I put it to you that you were perfectly right in not admitting any resolution for the expenditure of money for that purpose, and that I submit is your proper course now.

The Chairman: There is another alternative either go to the parish without estimates or else go to the parish with this resolution.

Mr Jones: The old board spent money on plans for the caretaker’s house.

Mr Hawksworth: I believe you will find that the money was voted in the first instance.

Mr Sharp: I submit you arejustified in refusing that resolution

Mr Norwood: I submit it is your duty to receive it

Mr Jones: Do you accept it? – The chairman: I will put you on these conditions – that if it fails at the parish meeting the advocates of it pay their own expenses

Mr Sharp: Do you accept that condition?

Mister. Jones: No I don’t think it is necessary.

Mr Norwood: I say is a duty of the council, having passed a resolution, to go on with certain work. They have to go to the parish and it is their duty to assess parish, certain some and how can they do that if they don’t know how much they want.

Mister. Sharp: out of what fund will these plans paid for if the parish consents and you raise a loan? – The chairman: out of the loan

Mr Sharp: There you are. You are incurring expenditure which you will pay out a sum that you are not yet authorised to spend

Mr F. Norwood: but it won’t require long to get plans prepared.

The Chairman: This will involve a loan, and I reject it on that principle – Mr Sharp: here, here.

The meeting then concluded, after two hours setting.