Memorandum submitted by the Southwark
Diocesan Advisory Committee
The Anglican Diocese of Southwark serves the
people of South London and East Surrey. The Diocese contains 378
churches, approximately half of which are listed. The Diocesan
Advisory Committee (DAC) is the body under the Care of Churches
and Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction Measure 1991 that advises the
Diocesan Chancellor and parishes on any works proposed to those
churches.
The Diocese of Southwark, as many other urban
dioceses, has a considerable number of over-large Victorian churches
that are too large for the current congregations (and were probably
too large even when they were built). Parishes need to be able
to explore imaginative ways of adapting such buildings for a variety
of uses and it is hoped that English Heritage, conservation officers
and the national amenity societies would look favourably on schemes
that seek to keep the buildings in use and thence preserve the
listed building in its environment.
At present, many congregations are preserving
churches which are a very important part of the nation's heritage
out of their own pockets. English Heritage and Heritage Lottery
Fund grants are only available for specific areas of concern and
the yearly total available is dwindling in real terms. Additionally,
there is a genuine concern that the 2012 Olympics, with its inevitable
escalating cost, will siphon funds from other deserving causes,
leaving a vacuum from which it will take years to recover.
The Southwark DAC is concerned that there are
an insufficient number of professionals with the relevant accreditation
in conservation as now required as a condition of EH/HLF grants.
Many architects work on listed buildings, providing new uses or
adapting them but this does not, at present, provide sufficient
criteria for accreditation. The DAC is also concerned that many
local authorities are dispensing with the services of in-house
conservation officers.
19 January 2006
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