GRIEF is a very personal emotion and it takes people in a variety of ways.

Part of that grieving process often involves going to a physical place, usually a graveyard, to visit a grave or memorial and remember the person we’ve lost.

Naturally, to personalise what would be an otherwise fairly anonymous spot, we have inscriptions on gravestones and may leave plants or flowers there, too.

Some people, however, go further and leave ornaments, windmills, personal items or even lanterns. They do this to keep the person’s memory alive for them and to create a special place of familiarity to visit.

Frankly, this is all understandable and there is definitely a school of thought that says whatever makes those left behind feel better in any way is worth doing.

However, there is another, equally valid school of thought that what is one person’s tribute is another’s outrage. As graveyards are public places of general uniformity and tranquillity where anyone can come and quietly reflect on personal memories, clashes of taste and interpretation as to what is acceptable at a grave are bound to happen.

From time to time, this results in headlines and council reviews and, currently, one has led to a change in policy in Bolton.

A family were upset when items they had left at a grave were simply removed and binned by workmen at Horwich Cemetery.

Now, while Bolton Council has approved plans for a more “robust tribute removal policy”, according to member for the environment Cllr Nick Peel, part of this would be to ensure that “everyone knows where they stand.”

The new policy means that officers will always make “reasonable attempts” to contact individuals about unsuitable items and put them in storage for collection.

It’s important that everyone knows what is and isn’t acceptable at graves and that people don’t go outside their marked areas with tributes. This is just common politeness.

But I think we would all like to believe there is also some leeway in personal tributes to allow relatives and friends to grieve properly for those they have lost. Gravesides are very sensitive areas and when negative things happen there it just heightens our sense of loss and hampers our progress to recovery from our grief.

We can only hope that commonsense rather than personal taste prevails on both sides here. A caring compromise seems the only answer.