Heritage Protection Reform Fears

Progress has continued with the work on heritage protection reforms in England and Wales. However, in a recent speech Andy Burnham MP, the Secretary of State for Culture, seemed to hint that the promised Bill might not appear in the Queen’s Speech (due on 3 December). This will be hugely disappointing after all the hard work which has gone into the drafting of the legislation. If there is no Bill, due to other priorities for the Government, the sector will need to work together to find ways to deliver the promised reforms without primary legislation, where this is possible. Fundamental will be the promised new Planning Policy Statement in England (and a similar document in Wales), building on the best of the current PPG15 and PPG16, and improving the public benefits derived from developer- funded archaeology. Look out for further news on this on the CBA website. Meanwhile, in Scotland all the historic environment policies of the Scottish Government have been brought together into a single Scottish Historic Environment Policy (SHEP) and work is underway to bring in many of the aspects of heritage protection reform being discussed in other parts of the UK without any apparent need for primary legislation.

For further details on the build-up to this legislation, please refer to our Conservation pages.