{"id":13810,"date":"2016-09-23T18:27:05","date_gmt":"2016-09-23T17:27:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ihbconline.co.uk\/newsachive\/?p=13810"},"modified":"2016-09-23T18:27:05","modified_gmt":"2016-09-23T17:27:05","slug":"local-authority-conservation-capacity-in-england-new-research-confirms-continued-decline-for-10-years-36-since-2006","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/?p=13810","title":{"rendered":"Local Authority conservation capacity in England: New research confirms continued decline for 10 years – 36% since 2006!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"general<\/a>IHBC research, funded and published by Historic England, shows the nation\u2019s local authority conservation services have continued to suffer in what is now a decade of cuts, as conservation capacity is reduced by a further 0.5% in the last year, with a shocking cumulative decline of 36% since 2006.<\/h3>\n

James Caird, IHBC Chair said: \u2018The continuing decline in local authority conservation staffing is disappointing.\u00a0 This is not least as it ignores substantial evidence that local conservation services are the best way – and best value – for LPAs to carry out their statutory duties under the Planning Acts as well as promoting heritage as a driver for urban and community renewal.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018The IHBC is doing what we can to mitigate impacts that are otherwise outside our control. \u00a0We collaborate sector-wide and in partnerships with like-minded bodies, such as the CIfA and the RTPI; offer national and local training; publish guidance, such as our Research and Guidance notes in our Toolbox, as well as offer advocacy resources, such as our \u2018Why Local Authorities need conservation skills<\/a>\u2019<\/em> website.\u2019<\/p>\n

IHBC President David McDonald, said: \u2018Our evidence, both statistically and anecdotally shows that local authorities are increasingly unable to cope with the pressure of applications and therefore not able to play a full part in meeting the government’s planning objectives.\u2019<\/p>\n

IHBC Director Sean O\u2019Reilly said: \u2018It is especially unfortunate too that much the same long-term, sorry story is also told by the parallel archaeology service data collected by ALGAO, in work also funded by Historic England, which shows a structurally damaging 13.5% fall in local authority archaeological specialists in the last year alone.\u2019<\/p>\n

Fiona Newton, who led the IHBC\u2019s role in the wider project, said: \u2018This Eighth Annual Report on Local Authority Staff Resources captures the dramatic impact of local government cutbacks on heritage management.\u00a0 Whilst the scale of the decline in conservation specialists has reduced to 0.5% in the last year, it still continues to fall each year and since 2006\u00a0the number of conservation specialists has fallen by 35.8%.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2018At the same time, in the last 12 months alone the number of planning application decisions increased by 3.6% and Listed Building Consent decisions increased by 0.62%. Whilst not the whole picture of the workload of conservation staff ,these increases illustrate the picture of rising workload and decreasing resources.\u2019<\/p>\n

For more recent background on conservation services see for example:<\/p>\n

Richard Bate in Context<\/a>\u00a0and the IHBC\u2019s website on LA skills<\/a>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

Download the Eighth report<\/a><\/p>\n

See more resources on our listing of papers<\/a>\u00a0and on our Toolbox<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

IHBC research, funded and published by Historic England, shows the nation\u2019s local authority conservation services have continued to suffer in what is now a decade of cuts, as conservation capacity is reduced by a further 0.5% in the last year, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13810","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ihbc-newsblog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13810"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13810\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13812,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13810\/revisions\/13812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}