The personal tragedies have been described behind new figures showing the rising number of so-called paupers' funerals in a Devon seaside resort.

Torbay Council spent more than £45,000 paying for so-called paupers’ funerals in the financial year just ended, new figures reveal. In the worst recent year the council had 68 requests when people there was no estate to pay for a funeral.

Nick Pannell, who chairs the Friends of Factory Row, a homeless hostel in Torquay, described each of these Public Health Act funerals as a 'personal tragedy' and said it was a sad reflection of life in the holiday resort with growing levels of povery and many isolated people. Each person had died alone without relatives and there was often nobody at all attending the funerals.

Torbay Council conducted 25 of what are known as Public Health Act funerals in the 2017/18 financial year, costing £46,500. The most expensive was £2,039. Local authorities pay for funerals when a deceased’s estate is too small to cover the cost.

There has been a generally upward trend in the number and cost of Public Health Act funerals in the Torbay towns in recent years:

2011/12: 18 (from 25 requests), total cost £17,823

2012/13: 29 (38), £17,389

2013/14: 22 (34), £16,011

2014/15: 29 (49), £33,442

2015/16: 36 (68), £55,570

2016/17: 32 (55), £53, 537

2017/18: 25 (35), £46,500

The council is usually able to recover some of the costs associated with the service, death certificate and administration, and its net expenditure in 2017/18, for example, was £31,535.

In 2017/18, all but one of the funerals were for men, none were for under-18s, and only four were for over-65s. There was a larger number of over-65s and a larger number of women in each of the previous years.

Mr Pannell, described each of these Public Health Act funerals as a personal tragedy saying: "There are lots of single, isolated people living in Torbay for complex reasons, to do with us being a seaside resort where people will retire, away from family connections.

“This is also an area with high levels of relative poverty compared with the rest of the West Country, it is an area with a vulnerable, homeless population.

“If that group of people die unbefriended than they are going to fall back on the resources of the local council. The fact that there may not be anyone to attend their funerals reflects on the society where we live.”