| ISSN 1357-4442 | Editor: Simon Denison |
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| UPDATE |
For several years the CBA has campaigned for a reduction in peat-extraction, in favour of the development of peat-free alternatives. Peat is an invaluable repository of organic ancient material, such as wood and leather, and for the delicate evidence of ancient landscapes and climate that rarely survives elsewhere.
Recently, the campaign scored a notable success. Last year, English Nature announced its intention to withdraw SSSI status from parts of two important peat bogs in South Yorkshire. The 7,500 acre Thorne and Hatfield Moors, near Doncaster, had become so damaged by years of milling that, according to English Nature, they no longer deserved their designation. The proposal would almost certainly have accelerated destruction of the peat.
In October, this magazine carried an article prompted by the proposal, `Why peat extraction must be stopped'. The article was part of a wider campaign, fought in partnership with other organisations in a Peatlands Campaign Consortium. In December, English Nature backed down, agreeing not to denotify the South Yorkshire moors. At the same time, Michael Meacher, the Environment Minister, announced that the Government would implement a review of its policy on peat.
A principal aim of the campaign, which continues, is to amend the legal definition of a `monument', to extend the range of sites that might enjoy the protection of scheduling. Non-structural evidence of human activity, of the type contained in peat-bogs, does not at present qualify. The campaign also aims to amend the concept of the `setting' of a scheduled monument. Under the Planning Act, planners must consider the effect a proposal may have on a monument's setting, but at present `setting' is regarded as the appearance of its surroundings. The CBA believes it should extend also to environmental and other evidence underground.
The CBA has also begun a campaign for amendments to the Government's proposed changes to the Primary National Curriculum. In January, Education Secretary David Blunkett proposed that only English, Maths, Science and Information Technology should be compulsory in primary schools, and that two extra hours a day should be devoted to literacy and numeracy - to be taken away, by inference, from `optional' subjects such as history.
The CBA, through its Education Committee, believes that an erosion of historical teaching in primary schools will inevitably, in time, be detrimental to British culture as a whole. It supports the view of Dr Nick Tait, Chief Executive of the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority (reported in The Times, 14 January), that schools with the best results in English and maths are those which devote attention to other subjects as well. In the CBA's view, literacy and numeracy can be taught in the context of other subjects, such as history, as well as on their own, while in recent years many primary schools have developed admirable ways of using archaeological artefacts and museums to stimulate in young children a life-long interest in the past.
Another CBA campaign has been to defend Britain's historic battlefields from development, particularly the threatened field at Tewkesbury. In June, British Archaeology ran an article, `The sad tale of Tewkesbury battlefield', which urged the Environment Secretary, John Prescott, to call in a decision to allow further housing developments at the Gastons, in the centre of the field where a decisive Wars of the Roses battle took place in 1471.
In the event, the Government did call in the proposal, and a public inquiry takes place this month. At the inquiry, the CBA will stress the national cultural importance of the battlefield, and remind the inspector of current public- policy commitments to protect battlefields, contained in government planning advice on roads (PPG13) and the historic environment (PPG15).
The CBA will also call on the Government for a clear statement of policy on the conservation of battlefields. In the CBA's view, if battlefields are worthy of protection, Tewkesbury, of all sites, must not be allowed to go.
The Defence of Britain project, a survey of 20th century military sites launched in 1995 by the CBA and other bodies, continues to make progress with the help of hundreds of volunteers (see BA, April 1995, July 1997). Records of around 6,000 sites, including plans and photographs, have now been submitted - the vast majority of them thought to have been previously unrecorded - and the process of entering the records into a computerised database is beginning.
A number of new initiatives are planned, including dayschools, and a package of information on military sites for teachers. In addition to gathering further records of sites, the project will now also seek personal recollections from the people who built and worked on them. Moreover, it will begin to focus in particular on anti-invasion defences, although military sites of all types will still be included.
Those wishing to help should contact the project manager, David O'Regan, on 01223 830280, or e-mail Defence.of.Britain@dial.pipex.com
The number of local branches of the Young Archaeologists' Club, run nationally by the CBA, last month reached 50.
The electronic journal, Internet Archaeology, launched in 1996 by a consortium including the CBA, now has over 7,000 registered readers. The journal's fifth issue is about to be produced.
The CBA has received a grant to enable it to digitise all its out-of-print Research Reports and Occasional Publications. The work will be undertaken over the coming months, and the CBA hopes eventually to place digital copies of all the publications on the Internet via the Archaeology Data Service at the University of York.
Meanwhile, the CBA's web pages, hosted on the server at
The British Academy, now have their own domain name,
http://www.britarch.ac.uk/cba. In 1997
the pages were accessed nearly 600,000 times from over 57,000
different computer systems. The numbers continue to rise and
already in January this year the pages were accessed over 70,000
times from over 7,000 different computer systems.
UPDATE is compiled by Simon Denison
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© Council for British Archaeology, 1998