“Will, or can you believe, the first interment ashes cost has gone up from around $450 in 2007/08 to, please sit down, $1664 today?,” Cr Brazel said.

The first interment burial cost has gone up from $1300 in 2007/08 to $2234 today, according to Cr Brazel.

“How many people walking around have a spare $8000 or $9000 in their pocket if they lose a loved one?” he said.

Moree Plains Shire Mayor Katrina Humphries believes the increase is inevitable.

“Council only get a one-off payment at the time of interment,” Cr Humphries said.

“There is no annual rent on each grave site; we don’t get any more money to keep the cemetery up to an acceptable standard,” she said.

When the council resolved to put the cemetery fees up at an ordinary council meeting Mr Brazel called for a division vote.

Nine councillors voted for the rise and one councillor, Cr Brazel, voted against.

Cr Brazel has a valid point, but Cr Humphries’s response is simple.

“The cost of everything has gone up; we all know that.

“At the end of the day, and I mean this in the utmost respect, it is not the funeral directors or family members who have to maintain our cemetery, it’s council, and we have a responsibility to those families to keep it up to an acceptable standard,” Cr Humphries said.

Mr Brazel believed rates for Pallamallawa residents would be going up more than 16 per cent and for residents who owned five or six acres or a little hobby farm, the increase would be about 20 per cent.

“Power, insurance, cost of living, rates, water, how can one survive?

“I believe the rise in the interment pricing policy will bring hardship to our community and I do not, and will not, support it,” Cr Brazel added.