MEMORANDUM BY ENGLISH HERITAGE (TCPF 01)
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 English Heritage is grateful to the
Committee for the opportunity of providing further information
on the issues that concern English Heritage following the Report
and Proceedings of the Committee dated27 October.
1.2 English Heritage rejects the criticism
in paragraphs 123 to 127 of the Committee's Report. There are
estimated to be 5,000 public parks in the United Kingdom. The
vast majority are owned, managed and maintained by local authorities,
whose main source of funding is the Revenue Support Grant administered
by the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions.
English Heritage's principal responsibility in relation to public
parks is compilation and the publication of the Register of
Historic Parks and Gardens of Special Historic Interest in England
against national standards. The Register currently contains 1,365
historic parks and gardens, of which 162 are public parks. The
main objectives of the Register are to protect the parks and gardens,
both public and private, and to encourage owners of registered
historic parks and gardens to recognise their value, as well as
to provide them with the advice necessary to manage them and,
where we are able, to provide funding. The majority of English
Heritage funding goes to private owners, who are the guardians
of the lion's share of England's outstanding historic landscapes,
which are open to the public and which do not benefit from the
Revenue Support Grant or Heritage Lottery Fund's (HLF) Urban Parks
Programme.
2. THE REGISTER
OF PARKS
AND GARDENS
OF SPECIAL
HISTORIC INTEREST
2.1 English Heritage was given the responsibility
of compiling the Register in the National Heritage Act 1983, in
line with our responsibility for recommending the listing of buildings.
The criteria covers the rarity (which is generally a function
of age), influence, value as a representative example, historical
association and group value of parks. They can be summarised as
follows:
(a) sites with a main phase of development
laid out before 1750, where at least some of the layout of this
date is still in evidence;
(b) sites with a main phase of development
laid out between 1750 and 1820, where enough survives to reflect
the original design;
(c) sites with a main phase of development
laid out between 1820 and 1880, where this is of importance (see
below) which survives intact or relatively intact;
(d) sites with a main phase of development
laid out between 1880 and 1939 where this is of high importance
(see below) and survives intact;
(e) sites with a main phase development laid
out post-war, but more than 30 years ago, where the work is of
exceptional importance;
Where importance as well as age is relevant,
the criteria are as follows:
(f) sites which were influential in the development
of taste whether through reputation or references in literature;
(g) sites which are early or representative
examples of a particular style or type of site,or of the work
of a designer (amateur or professional) of national importance;
(h) sites having an association with significant
persons or historical events;
(i) sites with strong group value with buildings
or other land, for example as part of a town planning scheme.
2.2 The majority of town and country parks
have developed by additions or alterations rather than as the
result of one single period of activity. Many, indeed, have been
subject to fairly continuous change. The value of a park or garden
may rest in the cumulative effect of the different phases, the
continuous development providing the interest. Conversely, sites
which are the result of one single phase of development alone
can be of particular interest for this reason.
2.3 The assessment will take condition into
account as well as historical significance. No matter how important
a site once was, or how much it is valued locally, it will not
be registered if too much of its historic structure and fabric
has been lost.
2.4 In 1996, English Heritage began a five-year
programme to review and update the Register. Since then 55 public
parks have been added to the Register. An important part of this
programme consists of a systematic resurvey of public parks. On
completion in 2002, we estimate that a further 50 public parks
will have been added to the Register. We anticipate that this
will be the maximum number eligible for registration under the
above criteria.
2.5 Last year, our grants to Grade I and
II* parks and gardens in the Register were incorporated in a new
Historic Buildings, Monuments, Parks and Gardens grant scheme,
through which we intend to offer £40 million between 1999
and 2002. Within this new scheme, we have identified parks and
gardens at risk as one of our four top priorities. We have also
raised the standard rate of grant for parks and gardens from 40
per cent to 50 per cent, and there will no longer be a ceiling
on the funding available for parks and gardens grants within the
total. Last year, we created three additional landscape architect
posts in our new regional structure to ensure that more specialist
landscape expertise is available in the regions. One of their
main tasks will be to encourage local authorities and private
owners to apply for grants.
3. PUBLIC PARKS
NOT INCLUDED
IN THE
REGISTER
3.1 We recognise that many parks are of
significant local historic interest and that all of them make
a contribution to the quality of life. They also have the potential
to act as a force in social and economic regeneration. English
Heritage is very concerned about the way in which public parks
have been underfunded over the years by local authorities and
we have sought to support them in a number of ways. These include
funding through our Conservation Area Partnership (CAPS) and Heritage
Economic Regeneration (HERS) schemes; advice in the establishment
and running of the HLF's Urban Parks Programme; and the written
guidance we are currently preparing on management plans for historic
parks which will help local authorities to identify the character,
value and significance of an historic park and to prepare policies
for its conservation, repair and enhancement.
3.2 Examples of our funding of parks under
our CAP Schemes include the New Walk in Leicester, a linear park
first laid out in 1785 that now forms a well-used traffic-free
pedestrian route across the city, which received £107,000
of CAP funding from English Heritage in 1995-96 and 1997-98, and
the Royal Pavilion Gardens in Brighton, restored in 1997 with
English Heritage grant aid as part of a much larger Conservation
Area Partnership programme that included works to a number of
streetscapes, squares, parks and gardens. Under our HER Scheme,
£18 million is being made available for social and economic
regeneration of conservation areas, which will include parks.
In response to the report of the Urban Task Force, we have proposed
to DETR that we should, in co-operation with the Groundwork Foundation,
take the lead in running the conservation-led Urban Renaissance
Fund that will give priority to urban green space and run-down
urban parks.
4. PARAGRAPH
124
4.1 In paragraph 124 of their Report, the
Committee writes that "if one compares the Register of
Parks and Gardens with the list of Historic Mill Buildings
for the same area [Greater Manchester], the failure of English
Heritage to provide a comprehensive listing is starkly obvious".
Neither the Register nor the List is intended to be a comprehensive
list. The list of historic buildings and the Register of Historic
Parks and Gardens are both selective. There are eight public parks
currently included in the Register in the Greater Manchester area.
By comparision, in May 1995 we completed a thematic study of the
eighteenth and nineteenth-century textile mills in Greater Manchester.
The selection process was explained in our 1995 publication Manchester
Mills. Of the 2,400 mills known to have existed, fewer than
1,200 have survived. Of these, just over 100 were selected for
listing, around 4 per cent of the original number. Ninety per
cent of the surviving examples were not recommended for listing.
5. PARAGRAPH
127
The Committee describes our commitment of staff
as "derisory". This comment is apparently based on our
evidence that we have seven members of staff working on the reveiw
of the Register, which currently has 1,365 entries. This compares
with 11 staff doing the equivalent work in relation to listed
buildings, where the list has 380,000 entries. In all, we have
some thirty specialist professional gardens and landscape staff.
The English Heritage Commission is advised by an expert Advisory
Committee, chaired by a Commissioner, which meets monthly. The
historians and conservation officers who are responsible for the
majority of our front-line casework deal equally with both buildings
and landscape. We are as vigorous in our defence of historic parks
and gardens as we are in the defence of historic buildings.
6. OTHER SPECIFIC
POINTS
6.1 Progress on the joint survey of parks
and historic parks and gardens, referred to in the Government's
response to the Committee's report (Cm 4550)
6.1.1 Questionnaires were mailed to over
450 Local Authorities in early November. By the end of January,
120 responses had been received. We are meeting the consultants
at the end of February to review the response and to begin the
process of analysis. We plan to publish a full report on the survey
in Spring 2000, and to follow this with a more detailed survey
indentifying those historic parks that are most at risk and which
are therefore priotities for action.
6.2 The availability of guidance or policy
advice to local authorities on how to manage registered and non-registered
historic landscapes
6.2.1 English Heritage staff are available
in every Government region to provide guidance to local authorities
and private owners on a wide range of issues affecting landscapes,
parks and gardens in addition to dealing with grants and planning
casework affecting Grade I and II* registered sites. When they
affect registered landscapes, we advise MAFF on stewardship schemes
and the Forestry Commission on Woodland grants.
6.2.2 As already stated, we are curently
preparing a guidance manual for professionals on the preparation
of management plans for historic parks and gardens in order to
assist local authorities in identifying the character, value and
significance of an historic park and preparing policies and outline
proposals for its conservation, repair and enhancement. We have
already published guidance on the care of the historic environment
which explicitly covers historic parks and gardens as well as
building. Examples relevant to the Committee's concerns include
Conservation Area Appraisals and Sustaining the Historic
Environment, both published in 1997. In the latter we explicitly
make the point that the historic environment consists of far more
than designated nationally important sites, and that buildings
and gardens with local value also need to be recognised, protected
and managed.
6.3 English Heritage's expenditure on listing
historic parks and gardens, and the number of staff committed
to this activity over the last ten years
6.3.1 In 1996/97 in order to reveiw the
Register, eight extra staff were taken on to augment the two to
three staff previously employed on the Register. Consultants have
aslo been employed at a cost of £120,000.
6.4 Progress on reviving GARLAND, the working
group looking at education and training issue
6.4.1 English Heritage took the initiative
last year in reconvening GARLAND, which includes representatives
of owners, contractors, horticultural colleges and professional
and craft organisations. The group shares the Committee's concerns
about the lack of sufficiently high quality staff and has identified
the following main issues:
— A poorly marketed profession with
a confusing career and training structure with 43 awarding bodies;
— Although many colleges are offering
courses in horticulture, many have reduced their practical content
and no longer require pre-college industrial experience and many
sandwich courses have reduced the industrial placement year to
six months. The introduction of CCT led to a reduction in the
number of horticultural training placements in local authorities.
A database needs to be set up of work placements available in
high quality gardens and parks;
— Modern Apprenticeships age limit
needs to be extended to include mature students who now make up
a significant number of those entering the industry.
6.4.2 LANTRA, the official education and
training agency for land-based industries, has welcomed advice
and support from GARLAND. Members of GARLAND will be meeting LANTRA
in March to discuss further action in more detail.
7. SUMMARY
7.1 We thought that we had made it clear
in our initial memorandum to the Committee that English Heritage
is very concerned about the way public parks have been undervalued
and underfunded in recent years and by the lack of maintenance,
management, commitment and experienced staff provided by local
authorities.
7.2 English Heritage was one of the first
bodies to recognise this problem. In March 1995, our Chairman,
Sir Jocelyn Stevens, held a meeting with representatives of the
former Association of Metropolitan Authorities, Association of
District Councils and Association of County Councils as a result
of which, together with the local authorities association, we
convened an Urban Parks Seminar in Manchester on 26 March 1996.
This Conference led to the establishment of the Urban Parks Programme
by the Heritage Lottery Fund.
7.3 We have been closely involved with the
HLF's Urban Parks Programme since it began. We have held numerous
seminars to stimulate good quality applications to the Fund for
the conservation and repair of urban parks. These were supported
by information packs and published "proceedings". The
HLF continually call upon our specialist expertise to assess applications
on their behalf, to monitor quality and progress on those projects
where grants have been awarded. The value of such projects monitored
by English Heritage is in the region of £80 million.
7.4 Our priorities are to encourage local
authorities to recognise the value of their historic parks, to
help them draw up management plans that will enable them to use
their limited resources as effectively as possible, and to assist
them in preparing bids for other sources of funding, such as the
HLF's Urban Parks Programme. We do not have the funding to do
any more.
7.5 We strongly support the last paragraph
of the Committee's Report: "We do believe the Government
ought to help local authorities find ways to reverse cutbacks
in park maintenance".
7.5.1 Meanwhile our priorities will remain:
(i) the review, selection and compilation
of the Register which will be completed in 2002 and is expected
to include around 50 more public urban parks;
(ii) the encouragement of local authorities
to maintain, manage and fund their urban parks;
(iii) to provide expert guidance and advice;
(iv) to provide funding of privately owned
parks who unlike the public parks have no other source of funding.
8. We do not support the establishment of
Urban Parks and Green Spaces Agency or a Review Committee. The
DETR and DCMS have in the last few weeks committed English Heritage
to lead a strategic review of the historic environment in consultation
with all the public, other funding bodies, local authorities and
a full range of interested groups. The plight of urban public
parks is so significant that it will be a matter of immediate
concern for this Review, which will be delivered to DCMS and DETR
in September and we suggest that this review is completed before
any such decision is taken.
English Heritage
February 2000
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