The Short Title of this Act shall be “The Auckland Burial-Ground Act 1871.”

The term “Superintendent” throughout this Act shall mean the Superintendent of the Province of Auckland.

For the purposes of this Act the Superintendent and his successors shall be and be deemed to be a body corporate and shall take and bear the name of “The Superintendent of the Province of Auckland” and by that name shall have perpetual succession and shall be capable in law to do and suffer whatever may be lawfully done and suffered by a body corporate.

The Superintendent shall with all convenient speed provide in such places as having regard to the public health may appear to him to be expedient burial-grounds of sufficient extent for the decent interment of the bodies of persons dying within the City of Auckland and its vicinity and the Superintendent may from time to time in case it shall appear to him necessary or expedient enlarge any burial-ground provided under this Act.

It shall be lawful for the Superintendent to make roads to such burial-grounds and to widen any existing roads for facilitating and improving the approaches to the same.

For any of the purposes of this Act the Superintendent may purchase any lands which he may deem expedient and may pay for the same out of money to be appropriated by the Provincial Council of Auckland to carry out the purposes of this Act.

Upon the request of the governing body of any separate religious denomination or sect the Superintendent may upon such terms and conditions not inconsistent with the known tenets or usages of such religious denomination or sect permanently appropriate and set apart a portion of any burial-ground provided under this Act to be used for the exclusive interment of the bodies of members of such denomination or sect.

When the Superintendent shall have provided any burial-ground and have made all such arrangements as he may think necessary for the interment in such ground of the bodies of the dead he shall give notice thereof in the Provincial Government Gazette and after a day to be fixed in such notice interments may be made in such burial-ground.

Whenever the Superintendent shall be of opinion that interments in any of the burial-grounds specified in the Schedule to this Act should be discontinued wholly or subject to any exceptions it shall be lawful for him by Proclamation to be published in the Auckland Provincial Government Gazette to order that interments shall be wholly discontinued or shall be discontinued subject to any exception or exceptions mentioned in such Proclamation from and after a day to be fixed in such Proclamation and such exception may from time to time be abolished varied and altered by a like Proclamation Provided that any burial-ground so closed shall be set apart as a public reserve and not diverted to any other purpose.

After the day so fixed it shall not be lawful to bury the dead in any burial-ground in which interment has by any such Proclamation been ordered to be discontinued except as therein mentioned and any person who shall after such time as aforesaid bury any body or in anywise aid or assist in the burial of any body in any burial-ground in which burials are ordered to be discontinued by such Proclamation as aforesaid except as in such Proclamation excepted shall forfeit and pay for any such offence any sum not exceeding one hundred pounds to be recovered in a summary way.

Every denomination or sect shall provide for the care of any burial-ground appropriated to its exclusive use and shall have the direction of the order and course in which such ground shall be opened and used for the purpose of interment and the times at which interments in such burial-ground may take place and the Superintendent shall provide in like manner and have the same powers in respect of burial-grounds not appointed to the exclusive use of any denomination or sect.

It shall be lawful for the relatives of any deceased person with the consent of the Superintendent in writing to cause the body of such deceased person to be removed from any of the burial-grounds specified in the Schedule to this Act and to be interred in any burial-ground provided under this Act.

The Superintendent in respect of any burial-grounds provided under this Act and not appropriated exclusively to any denomination or sect as hereinbefore provided may make regulations from time to time as to depth and formation of graves and places of interment the nature of coffins to be received in such burial-grounds the notice to be given in respect of funerals and generally as to all matters connected with the good order of such burial-ground and the convenient interment of bodies therein.

There shall be paid upon interments in any burial-ground provided under this Act such fees or sums as the Superintendent shall from time to time fix in this behalf which fees or sums shall be applied to such purposes in such burial-ground as the Superintendent shall from time to time direct.

It shall be lawful for the Superintendent from time to time to sell and dispose of any lands purchased by him under this Act which may not be required for a burial-ground and which may not have been appropriated to any religious denomination or sect and not used for the burial of the dead and for completing and carrying any such sales into effect he may make sign and execute a conveyance of the land and the signature thereof by the Superintendent shall be deemed to be a good valid and effectual execution and a receipt for the purchase money therein shall be a discharge to the purchaser The money to arise from such sale and disposal shall be subject to appropriation by the Provincial Council of the Province of Auckland.

Nothing in this Act contained shall take away from or deprive any person of the right to proceed by way of indictment for a nuisance or to take any other legal proceedings he may think fit.