Call for change to avert heritage crisis

The Country Land and Business Association (CLA) said measures used to protected houses, barns, mills, commercial buildings, hill forts and stone walls were “dysfunctional” and that new thinking was needed to avert a crisis.

Its report, Averting Crisis in Heritage, offers solutions which it claims will cost no extra investment from the Treasury but will serve to stem the decline of the nation’s heritage.

The CLA claims its membership is responsible for the management of 25 per cent of the heritage in England and Wales.

William Worsley, the president of the CLA and a Yorkshire landowner, said: “The current provisions are hindering rather than helping the management of heritage. It is difficult to think of the country without these great buildings such as barns and listed cottages that one might see in the Dales. It is of course of particular attraction to our foreign visitors and Yorkshire in particular has lots of heritage.”

The CLA was particularly critical of a current Heritage Bill which it says is “too complex and will never happen”. It said the Department of Culture, Media and Sport was wrong in its thinking that heritage was mostly paid for by the State, and was instead almost entirely funded by those who own it and use it. The CLA also claimed that the State currently takes more in tax from heritage than the small amount it spends on it.

Mr Worsley said: “Local authorities do not have the skilled conservation staff that the existing heritage system demands, but the Government and English Heritage seem to be in denial about the extent of the problem. It has been obvious for many years that the system is not working properly. The previous Government began the still-ongoing Heritage Protection Review in 1999 but this never diagnosed the real problems and never produced solutions which work.

“The CLA’s recommendations set out to increase, rather than reduce, heritage protection. They aim to increase a heritage system which works with the resources available, focusing them where they are most effective, and improving heritage policy to make desirable change easier and undesirable change harder.”

Criticism was also reserved for English Heritage’s National Heritage Protection Plan which it says “diverts resources and attention from the real problems by focusing on researching and designating new areas of heritage”.

Mr Worlsey said: “The CLA has analysed the real problems, such as the difficulty in getting consent for sympathetic changes, and come up with solutions so that heritage can be valued, used and relevant to the future. Our recommendations are not vague aspirations. They are easily achievable and realistic. Almost all involve no substantive new spending by the Government, or even involve much more effort from it because they are for the heritage sector to implement.”

The CLA denied some of its ideas were “risky”, saying the under-resourced approach to handling heritage was far more dangerous.

“We need to act soon,” it concluded. “If we can get this right we will have a healthy and valued heritage to pass on to our children and grandchildren.”

The Department of Culture, Media and Sport maintained it is “committed to protecting and conserving” heritage. A spokeswoman added: “We welcome this new report...and will be looking at it in more detail.”