BENARTY families are being insulted by Fife Council, two Ballingry based councillors claimed this week.

The condition of Ballingry cemetery, which is the resting place for hundreds of families’ relatives, has infuriated Mary Lockhart and Lea McLelland.

Uncut grass and overflowing bins are, the councillors say, just not the appropriate way for such an important facility to be kept.

However, this week Liz Murphy, the head of the local authority’s cemetery service, said that ‘staffing shortages’ had caused the problem and she re-assured that these would be sorted out. But Mary Lockhart and Lea McLelland feel that the many visitors to their families’ graves do not deserve to be met with long grass and dandelions covering graves and spilling bins.

Said Mary: “This has been a problem in both the old and new parts of the cemetery for months now. I have cleaned out the bin in the old cemetery myself three times because it has been overflowing and that surely sends out a message that the council does not care about Benarty families.”

Lea added: “A cemetery is an emotional place for people to visit lost members of their family and to be met with a mess is simply not right.

“It seems to show a complete lack of respect for the families of the whole Benarty area. Some families have even been cutting the grass of their graves because of the condition the cemetery has been left in.”

Liz Murphy, Bereavement Services Manager said: “I’d like to reassure visitors to Ballingry Cemetery that whilst we’ve had some staff shortages affecting the level of service we would normally hope to deliver, clean-up work is under way with grass cutting and bin emptying due to be completed in the next day or two. We apologise for this disruption in service.”