General information, not legal advice. Cemeteries & Crematoria NSW, the regulator, publishes the guidelines this page draws on; they are written for cemetery and crematorium operators, drafted in consultation with communities, and they highlight common requirements.
NSW
What the licence asks
NSW’s Interment Industry Scheme requires all cemetery and crematorium operators to be licensed and to comply with licence conditions. Its regulations began on 14 October 2022, and licensing from 1 July 2023. Three of its rules bear directly on an Aboriginal burial:
- The principles. Licence condition E.2 requires operators to take all reasonable steps to comply with the Aboriginal Cultural and Spiritual Principles.
- The part of the cemetery. Section 46 of the Cemeteries and Crematoria Act 2013 requires an operator to take all reasonable steps to carry out interments in line with the cultural or religious practice that applied to the part of the cemetery where the grave is, at the time the right to the grave was granted.
- The price. An operator may charge extra for religious or cultural practices, but the charge must be set out in the consumer contract and the operator must explain its basis.
NSW
Choosing the place
Burial, the guidelines say, is far more common than cremation among Aboriginal people in NSW, and where possible the preference is to be buried on Country. In a cemetery, a place in a designated Aboriginal area, or close to family, would be the preference for most, and where operators talk with the family beforehand, they are asked to set out the options before they sell a grave.
Direction can matter too. Some communities lay the person with the head facing north, or with the feet toward the ocean. The guidelines ask operators to check this when they sell the right to the grave, and, if the layout of the cemetery will not allow it, to tell the family before the sale.
The choice is usually for good. The guidelines say burial is usually in perpetuity for Aboriginal people, and that disturbing a person once buried is culturally inappropriate.
NSW
Preparing the person
Communities differ in how the body is prepared, how the person is dressed and what goes into the coffin. The guidelines give examples:
“Some communities have no specific requirements, while others may:
- want family or kin to wash and prepare the body
- put ochre body paint on the deceased before they are dressed
- wrap the deceased in a possum-skin cloak or burial cloak
- place the deceased’s totem in the coffin before it is closed
- place a handful of soil in the coffin before it is closed
- perform blessings and other cultural practices.”
Cemeteries & Crematoria NSW, “Guidelines for Aboriginal cultural and spiritual requirements for burial and cremation in NSW” (CC BY 4.0)
A burial in a shroud rather than a coffin needs an exemption under the public health regulations, and the funeral director or the family should tell the cemetery if a shroud burial is the person’s cultural requirement. Some families may also prefer to dig the grave themselves, or to help prepare it.
NSW
The day itself
Much of what the guidelines describe is about time and space, and they ask cemeteries to allow for both.
| Practice | What the guidelines say |
|---|---|
| Burial in daylight | Some communities may have a cultural requirement to bury in daylight. |
| The long carry | Some communities require kin and key community members to walk the coffin from the cemetery’s front gate to the grave. |
| Waiting for everyone | For some communities certain people must attend, and the ceremony cannot begin until everyone who should be there has arrived. |
| A large gathering | More than 450 people is not uncommon, especially when an Elder or an important member of the community has died, or the person comes from a large family. |
| A smoking ceremony | It may be held before the funeral, at the site, or at the end of the service; family or community usually carry it out, and where it is the person’s cultural requirement, operators should try to accommodate it. |
| Soil and the grave | In some communities everyone present throws soil into the grave; family may ask to lower the person in or fill the grave by hand, and operators are asked to accommodate this where they can. |
The guidelines also note that the funeral may be delayed so the person can be returned to Country or people can travel, and that decisions can take longer when kinship means several family members are involved in planning.
NSW
After the burial
The guidelines say there may be cultural practices in the days, months and years after a burial, and list some that family and community may carry out at the grave: cleaning it, which may be done regularly or on anniversaries and other significant dates; totems, monuments and other decoration, which differs widely across the state but may include “mass flowers”, shells, rocks or melted glass covering the grave; revisits, which may come at any time, though most often on anniversaries or other significant dates, and which large groups may attend; and marking its borders after a year or longer. For Torres Strait Islander families, the guidelines mention a memorial opening or unveiling, which Sorry Business and the funeral also mentions.