Ann Widdecombe funeral arrangements moved into their final stage this week, with a requiem mass at Buckfast Abbey in Devon on Wednesday. The service is private, and her family has asked that it be limited to those closest to her.
Bucketfast Abbey said she would be “missed and fondly remembered,” and described her as “many in our worshipping community knew her as a kind and warm character.” The abbey also said, “Ann was a woman of profound faith, a faith which found expression in the public forum of politics.”
Buckfast Abbey on Wednesday
The private requiem mass will include a homily from the Rt Rev David Charlesworth. In Catholic practice, a requiem mass is a funeral service offered for the dead, and here it is being used for a woman the abbey described as having “unwavering convictions” shaped by her Roman Catholic faith.
Widdecombe died on 8 July at 78. She was first elected as a Conservative MP in Kent in 1987, served as a prisons minister in the 1990s, later became an MEP for the Brexit Party, and at the time of her death was a spokeswoman on immigration and justice for Reform UK.
Family request for privacy
Her family said, “While we are very grateful for the wide expression of condolences, the family would ask that this initial service is limited to those closest to Ann.” That sets the tone for the week’s service: a religious farewell first, with the public part held back for later.
The same family statement added, “A more public memorial will follow later in the year, the details of which will be released in due course.” For readers who want to attend that later memorial, the practical point is simple: only the later announcement will set out the venue and timing, while Wednesday’s service remains reserved for family and the worshipping community that knew her at Buckfast Abbey.
Joshua Kerry charge
The funeral comes after Joshua Kerry, 28, from Rotherham, South Yorkshire, was charged with her murder on 20 July. That charge gives the service an added legal and personal weight, but the abbey’s focus this week remains on the private mass and the public memorial still to come later in the year.
For now, Buckfast Abbey is the centre of the farewell, and the next detail readers need is the later memorial announcement, not a public turnout on Wednesday.
