Anyone can set up as a funeral director in England, Wales or Northern Ireland. There is no licence to obtain, no mandatory inspection regime to pass, and no statutory body with the power to strike an operator off. The only regulatory foothold sits with the Financial Conduct Authority, and even that applies narrowly to pre-paid funeral plans rather than to how bodies are stored, transported or handled.
Voluntary standards, no legal teeth
Two trade bodies, the National Association of Funeral Directors and the National Society of Allied and Independent Funeral Directors, maintain codes of practice and membership criteria intended to uphold standards across the sector. Membership is optional. A funeral home can decline to join either organisation and continue trading without consequence, because the codes carry no statutory weight. General law still applies - health and safety legislation, competition rules, consumer protection statutes - but none of these frameworks was designed with the specific risks of handling the deceased in mind.
A sector described as an "unregulated free for all"
That phrase comes from the independent inquiry into the David Fuller case, whose phase 2 reports in 2024 and 2025 urged the government to introduce a statutory regulatory scheme for funeral directors in England "as a matter of urgency". The Competition and Markets Authority had already flagged similar concerns in 2020, recommending an inspection and registration body to monitor the transportation and care of the deceased, alongside measures to improve price transparency for grieving families who often have little time or appetite to compare providers.
Public concern sharpened further in 2024, when a Humberside Police investigation into Legacy Independent Funeral Directors in Hull led to funeral director Robert Bush being charged with 64 offences, including 30 counts of preventing a lawful and decent burial. His eventual sentencing, in July 2026, prompted the government to announce plans to tackle rogue operators in the sector - a direct response to a case that exposed how little oversight exists once a body is in a funeral director's care.
Government hesitation versus mounting calls for reform
The policy record shows persistent reluctance to legislate, even as evidence accumulates. The previous Conservative government argued that full statutory regulation might be disproportionate, favouring a co-regulatory model built on collaboration with industry bodies instead. It had nonetheless planned a call for evidence following the Hull case before the 2024 general election intervened. The Labour government that followed has spoken of considering "some form" of regulation, while insisting any new rules be "proportionate" - language that signals caution rather than commitment. By autumn 2025 work was said to be ongoing across departments, and by March 2026 the Ministry of Justice confirmed it was examining whether criminal law relating to the deceased needs strengthening, including potential new offences. Each step has moved slowly relative to the urgency expressed by the Fuller inquiry.
Scotland's contrasting approach
North of the border, a statutory framework now governs the sector, built on lessons from a different scandal: failures in infant cremation practice that came to light more than a decade ago. The Infant Cremation Commission's 2014 report and a subsequent national investigation in 2016 both concluded that funeral directing needed formal oversight. The Scottish Parliament responded with the Burial and Cremation (Scotland) Act 2016, establishing inspection powers, a code of practice and a licensing scheme for funeral directors.
- Inspection and enforcement regulations for funeral businesses and burial and cremation authorities came into force on 1 March 2025, following consultations in 2017 and 2023 that showed near-unanimous support for inspections.
- A statutory code of practice setting minimum standards, approved by the Scottish Parliament in January 2024, also took effect on 1 March 2025.
- A public, searchable Funeral Sector Register went live on 1 April 2025, giving families a way to check which providers are active and accountable.
- A full licensing scheme for funeral directors remains under development.
The gap between the two systems is now stark. Scotland has moved from scandal to statute, inspection and a public register within roughly a decade. England, Wales and Northern Ireland remain at the stage of reviews, recommendations and departmental "exploration," despite repeated warnings from regulators and a public inquiry that the current arrangement leaves bereaved families with no reliable way to judge whether a funeral director meets any enforceable standard at all.