Examination of Witnesses (Questions 58-59)
RT HON
MARGARET HODGE
MP AND DR
SIMON THURLEY
2 JULY 2008
Chairman: Good afternoon everybody. This
is the second session of the Committee's examination of the Heritage
Protection Bill. We are delighted to welcome this afternoon the
Minister, Margaret Hodge, and the Chief Executive of English Heritage,
Dr Simon Thurley. Before I begin, Helen Southworth would like
to make a brief statement.
Helen Southworth: If I could remind people
that my husband is the Head of the Museum Service for Lancashire
County Council.
Mr Evans: And a jolly good job he does
too!
Q58 Chairman: So if I could begin,
Minister, this Bill, which has been largely welcomed by the heritage
sector, first began to be discussed in July 2003. We are now three
years later and we obviously welcome very much the fact that this
Committee has the opportunity to carry out pre-legislative scrutiny,
but we have received a number of criticisms that it is difficult
to undertake that when there are still parts of the Bill which
have not been published. Can you say why it is that after three
years there are still bits of the Bill which have not yet come
out in their final form? Is there going to be an opportunity for
the sector to be consulted on those parts that we are still awaiting?
Margaret Hodge: We could always
have done better, but you are considering a draft version of the
Bill, and therefore we are working towards getting all the clauses
actually written in time, hopefully, for the next session of Parliament.
You will know that Parliamentary Counsel only gets engaged when
it is pretty clear that you will get a slot in the legislation,
so what we did was draft those clauses which implied some policy
change or were more important first so that in your consideration
of the Bill you could see those. The ones that still need to be
drafted are on the whole those where we are just transferring
existing legislation into the new legislation. On the whole policy
has been determined, but you never quite know in these last few
months what might emerge, and we will consult. To be fair, it
is only really the wording and clearly we will try and consult
as best we can. I know the conservation area clauses are the ones
that are causing particular concern. We have now published those
and we will consult on the draft clauses. It is not quite as long
a period of consultation as we would have liked. Instead of the
usual three months it will probably be six or eight weeks. Policy
has been decided. There are one or two other little bits such
as the receiver of wreck duties where there are new duties on
him or her to collect data, where there have been some problems
over devolution issues so we have had to sort that out before
we could give it to Parliamentary Counsel to draft, but there
will be full consultation, and I think the key clauses are already
out there. I suppose the last thing I would say is that we have
already started publishing draft guidance so there we are ahead
of the game. We have done that around the ecclesiastical issues
and the Historic Environment Records, which are two new areas,
and again that is in an attempt to be as consultative and as open
as we can be.
Q59 Chairman: So when do you think
we are going to see the full Bill?
Margaret Hodge: I hope for next
session.
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