 
Some Proposals for better co-operation between local societies and English Heritage, Historic Scotland, and CADWEnglish Heritage and its congeners have little co-operation with local amateur societies and rarely consults them about what it is doing in their areas. Thus major projects such as: * Urban Databases all appear to be done with little co-operation with local societies. Similarly, Monuments in care (guardianship monuments) are run without reference to local societies. The CIA would like to suggest that a system should be established where, as a matter of course, local societies should always be consulted about work carried out by, or initiated by the State bodies in their area. The State bodies (henceforward SBs) should regard the independent local archaeological societies as the stakeholders for archaeology in their area. The SBs should always seek to co-operate with such societies, notably those that are long established and can demonstrate their independence. We would therefore suggest that: Management schemes. All schemes for the management of monuments should be referred to the stakeholders in the area. Where small scale explorations are needed, the stakeholders should be given the opportunity to carry out this work, and should be given the facilities to do so. Urban Databases. The stakeholding societies should be consulted before the establishment of Urban databases or other survey projects in their area. Indeed it should be considered whether in some cases, it would be better to funnel grants for compiling urban databases through the local society, thus ensuring the closest local co-operation. Monuments in Care. Work on Monuments in care should not be carried out without consultation with the stakeholding society. Stakeholders should be encouraged to believe that they too have a major stake in the monument, and should be encouraged to research it Paperwork . Much of the paperwork that is perhaps necessary in running professional archaeology is unnecessary and harmful to schemes run by volunteers. Thus MAP 3 (Management of Archaeological Projects, version 3) is not suitable for extension outside the civil service, while applications for Scheduled Monument Consent need to be simplified for non-professional archaeologists. Preservation in situ. The doctrine of preservation in situ also needs to be amended. We should note for instance the damage done to many ‘scheduled’ monuments by e.g. the lowering of the water table. We should also emphasise that the legal protection of monuments is likely to be ineffective unless it is accompanied by local support. When applications are made for Consent for small scale interventions on a Scheduled Monument, there should be a presumption in favour of giving such consent unless it can be shown to be positively harmful and unnecessary.
|