The recent meeting of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Civic Societies, attended by a number of senior IHBC officers, explored communities in heritage to great acclaim, with key media and political figures present including Civic Voice president Griff Rhys Jones and Civic Voice’s lead in the House of Lords, Baroness Andrews, all as reported on below by Henry Russell, IHBC’s interim Education Secretary, for The Heritage Alliance Bulletin.
IHBC President David McDonald said: ‘It was an extremely useful afternoon, highlighting the voice of communities in heritage care and how they can help press local authorities to offer credible conservation services for their core clients: the local communities themselves!’
‘The theme is also especially pertinent to the IHBC this year, of course, as it coincides with the content of our 2016 UK conference, our Annual School, in Worcester in June, which will take as its theme ‘People Power: Catalyst for Change’!
Henry Russell, interim IHBC Education Secretary and THA , writes:
The Civic Societies All Party Parliamentary Group met on 27 January to discuss how communities can have a part to play when it comes to protecting heritage. Speakers were Civic Voice president Griff Rhys Jones, Civic Voice’s lead in the House of Lords, Baroness Andrews, Carole Souter (CEO Heritage Lottery Fund) and Deborah Lamb (Director of Engagement, Historic England). It was chaired by Craig Mackinlay.
Deborah Lamb said Historic England saw the following pressures over the next five years:
- New housing growth, in particular the pressure to get well designed houses in the right places
- The erosion of local character, often by attrition over a period of time.
- Making Historic England more relevant, and engaging the public, especially younger audiences
- Declining funding, which means developing new ways of working.
- Cuts to local authority conservation by 31% since 2006. This presents a greater risk to Grade II buildings where HE has limited remit.
- There will be demand for increased skills to cover infrastructure projects like HS2 and the Palace of Westminster renovation.
She also mentioned the ‘Enriching the List’ project which will have soft launch soon. It is a web database of listed buildings to which the public can contribute further information and details.
Carole Souter spoken about the HLF’s work. She underlined the wide definition of heritage the HLF works to, and said the focus of their funding was people as much as buildings. Of every £1 spent on lottery tickets 5.6p goes to heritage. Since 1994, HLF has funded 39,000 projects to a total of £B6.8.
Baroness Andrews, former char of English Heritage and a member the Hose of Lords Built Environment select committee spoke of its work which will result in a report in March. It will aim to provide a long-term strategy for planning, and how the historic environment can play its part in that. The questions it will tackle are
- Is the National Planning Policy Framework doing its job?
- How effectively is planning and the environment being regulated?
- How can we achieve good place making?
She spoke also of the challenges of getting successful large new developments integrated into historic market towns, and gave the example of Lewes in e Sussex, and urged the meeting to champion the ‘heritage of the ordinary’
Finally, she expressed concern about the potential for erosion of local democracy in the provisions of the Housing and Planning bill currently going through Parliament.
Civic Voice president Griff Rhys Jones said that the historic environment had to be part of the future. Change is inevitable – the challenge was to get well designed new buildings.
The question and answer session which followed focused on concerns bout the loss of democracy in the Housing and Planning Bill, how heritage bodies can network better, and a speakers from London, Kingston, Kent, Highgate and Liverpool raised local issues about lack of local authority responses to local opinion. The issue of giving third party rights to appeal against planning decisions was raised.
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