Labour MP Rachael Maskell has secured a ministerial meeting over funeral-sector regulation and a planned low-cost cremation and body-storage facility in York.
Maskell told the Commons that the planned site could store up to 700 bodies and argued that the proposal had exposed gaps in oversight, planning and safeguards for bereaved families.
Health Secretary Yvette Cooper said the government had established the principle of comprehensive regulation for the funeral sector and was developing proposals through consultation with the sector.
The commitment reflects wider concern about the absence of a single statutory framework covering all funeral directors and mortuary services.
Cooper did not commit to stopping the York facility, which City of York Council approved at the start of October.
The meeting will allow Maskell to press for national standards, as ministers decide how sector-wide regulation should apply to facilities such as the one planned in York.
