26 January 2006
Culture Minister David Lammy delivers key heritage speech at the "Capturing The Value of Heritage" conference at the Royal Geographical Society
Ladies and Gentlemen. I am very pleased indeed to be here with you this morning.
Today we are looking at practical issues. And I want to highlight some of the challenges, and set the scene for the session this afternoon on "Whose values?".
But let's begin by reflecting a little on the past. On events that have brought us, as a sector, to this conference today.
Since I have been Minister of Culture, I have been contemplating how and when the concept of heritage emerged. At what point did we, as a nation, start thinking about what is it we value and start talking about it as our "heritage"?
Arguably, we can trace it back to another period of rapid economic and social change. We know don't we that in the late Victorian era, 'progress' was the watchword. And the demands of urbanisation and industrialisation often seemed to have little regard for the civic fabric. Whilst Victorian developers might have designed in the Gothic manner, they also merrily gutted much of our medieval heritage.
In response, William Morris established the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings in 1877 both to preserve existing structures and to "counteract the highly destructive 'restoration' of medieval buildings". And so was born the heritage protection system that we have in place today, and which we are in the processes of streamlining and reforming.
top
Morris didn't act alone. John Ruskin's other great disciple, Octavia Hill, went on to found the National Trust. Others joined the blossoming Arts and Crafts movement. All shared a concern for conserving the natural and built heritage from the worst excesses of urban, industrial society. Yes a little elitist in conception, but nonetheless progressive in results: their vision was a radical desire for the British people to enjoy their national heritage. As Octavia Hill put it, to "make lives noble, homes happy and family life good."
So the heritage movement that emerged in the late 19th and early 20th century was driven - to a large extent – by a desire to reflect and promote social change, supported by an interest in curtailing the excesses of the new breed of designers and architects.
It was the same impulse which in 1926 led Patrick Abercrombie and others to found the Council for the Preservation of Rural England. Not as a wish to mummify the countryside, but to preserve a public connection with the past threatened by tearing development and social change.
So too in the 1940s. As Liz Forgan reminded us last year it was a Labour government committed to opening up the heritage for all established the National Land Fund. Its remit was to buy areas of countryside together with historic buildings, which would be opened up to the public, as a memorial to those that had died in both world wars, preserving the physical aspects of nationhood that they had given their lives for.
top
It was an act of living memorial never intended to be of monuments and medals, but of space, belonging to the people. It is worth recalling Chancellor Hugh Dalton's great words: "It is surely fitting in this proud moment of history, when we are celebrating victory and deliverance from overwhelming evils and horrors, that we should make through this Fund a thank-offering for victory, and a war-memorial which many would think finer than any work of art in stone or bronze." Here was a supremely inclusive idea of heritage – which today lives on in the National Heritage Memorial Fund.
But as the post-war consumer age took hold, the Fund was sidelined. Britain, it was felt, had too much heritage. Extraordinarily, in 1957, the Treasury Minister and English patriot Enoch Powell dismantled the Fund by slashing its budget by 80%. The following decades witnessed a steady deterioration in our care for the natural and built environment. Our great medieval and Victorian city centres were gutted by planners and politicians, while our stock of historic houses were left to rot.
It was only the sale of Mentmore House and its contents in 1977 which re-kindled a public outcry and led to the creation of the National Heritage Memorial Fund –. And with it - for the first time - the concept of "national heritage" –. Shortly afterward, English Heritage emerged and the heritage world started looking much as we know it today.
top
Much of what flowed from this period of policy introspection was for the good. New safeguards, tax-breaks and funds emerged. But, at the same time, in certain circles, heritage began to be a dirty word. Against the backdrop of ITV's Brideshead Revisited, heritage began to have inherently conservative, narrow-minded connotations. The poet Tom Paulin voiced it most succinctly, 'The British heritage industry is a loathsome collection of theme parks and dead values.' A thesis expanded upon at great length in Robert Hewison's The Heritage Industry and Patrick Wright's On Living in an Old Country. This was all far removed from the vision of Octavia Hill and Hugh Dalton.
This is important because there's a clear pattern here.
And one which I think is highly relevant to our deliberations today.
Although the push for change has often come from the elite vanguard, time and time again the driver has been the need to address social change in periods of rapid economic and cultural change. They responded to what the public wanted, and what society needed. Our predecessors both in and outside Government were the radicals of their day.
Amidst today's globalisation and the challenge of building a multi-racial, multi-cultural society, can we recreate that sense of a heritage movement, and one that is right for 21st Britain? I want us to learn from the success of those in the 'green' movement. who have become a world-wide force to be reckoned with by instilling a passion in communities.
top
And there is no doubt the popular will is there today. We see:
- 58 million visits to historic visitor attractions in 2004;
- 3.4 million members of the National Trust and over half a million members of English Heritage;
- 157,000 volunteers within the sector;
- 100,000 visitors to 310 sites in the first National Archaeology Week last July;
- Over 3 million viewers to the BBC's Restoration programme and 2.5 million to Channel 4's Time Team programme.
To me it is no surprise, that one of the heaviest uses of the Internet is for genealogical family and local history research. In a society increasingly lacking the traditional social signifiers of class, religion and local labour markets, more and more people want to find out who they are, where they come from, what their roots are. Even Jeremy Paxman!
Many organisations have risen to exploit his challenge. The HLF's Young Roots programme helps young people to find out about their heritage, using their interests and ideas, and their creativity and energy. These grant, each under £50,000, show the Fund's commitment to funding innovative, community-focused projects across the country and celebrate the country's 'hidden histories'.
top
We in Government are being radical. We are reforming the way we designate and protect the nation's heritage. Many of you are involved. We are looking at how we can make the system more transparent, more open, more flexible. Perhaps most importantly, we are looking at how we give ownership back to the local communities themselves.
We have some way to go. The heritage sector is perceived as experts talking to themselves. There is a lack of trust. The experts are seen as only willing to engage with communities on their own terms – and in a language that excludes those to whom they are talking.
And it you don't want to believe the research just listen to the experience of the people of Castleford. We will soon be hearing the Castelford Choir singing about what heritage means to them. With support from both the Heritage Lottery Fund and English Heritage, this community has found its voice. But it had to overcome a raft of obstacles first. And who put these obstacles in their way?
top
It was us – the heritage community – the very people who claim to be representing what the public value.
Castleford, you see, had been condemned:
Pevsner called it a cultural wasteland
A Roman milestone was removed from the town to the British Museum on the grounds that the people of Castleford would not know how to look after it and,
The Museums Service refused to bring objects out of store to show at the inaugural meeting on the grounds that they were priceless.
The messages were clear. The heritage experts did not "trust the community" or believe in what they were doing. Now with a membership of over 300 the Castleford Heritage Group has taken control and has developed a new kind of relationship with the heritage experts.
top
But perhaps the most interesting part of this story was what one of the heritage experts said himself:
"Much is made of the words 'facilitation', 'advocacy' and 'enabling' but no one had ever explained what these words mean. The Castleford project has given me an opportunity to explore what these words might mean – and by extension the skills required by heritage managers. Heritage management is about the technical aspect of conservation, but it is equally about encouraging and drawing out local skills, knowledge and experience of place rather than dictating what is of cultural significance"
But conceptions of heritage and 'whose heritage' are becoming all the more complex in modern Britain. How today do we nurture a national heritage? There is no easy answer – and, quite rightly, organisations like the HLF and NHMF take a responsive approach to the issue. It is up to people, institutions and civil society to determine their own conceptions of heritage. Slowly, elements of national heritage – be they the NHS, Canterbury Cathedral? , Hadrian's Wall, the Empire Windrush – accumulate within the national psyche.
We must all step up to that challenge. One way forward is the scheme I launched earlier this month – English Icons. For whether it is a cup of tea or Holbein's portrait of Henry VIII: when these symbols of Englishness are unpicked, they immediately reveal the multi-layered, multi-cultural element of English and British heritage. From the Romans to the Normans to the Dutch invasion of 1688, our island stories are typically global and then imperial. It was the tea-pickers of Sri Lanka and the Lascar dockers of Woolwich as much as the tea-merchants of Surrey who established the Englishness of a cup of tea.
top
This afternoon you will look at your institutional values in the debate about "Whose heritage? " I hope you will also ask yourselves again - as Tessa asked you in her essay last year – what more we can do to encourage greater diversity into both the heritage workforce and its audience. We need to tackle this head on if we are to achieve the legitimacy to represent and advocate for the public value of heritage
In Bradford middle class Asians are working hard to preserve their heritage – the mills from the industrial revolution. These buildings represent the beginning of their economic contribution to Britain. They help them feel part of Britain.
Remember too that the Sikh community is travelling by bus up and down the country visiting sites and artefacts highlighted on the Anglo-Sikh heritage trail – a trail which highlights the contribution their community has made to Britain.
And in London, where we said goodbye to the last Routemaster buses last month, the biggest tears were from the West Indian drivers and conductors for whom the Routemaster came to symbolise their journey to London in pursuit of a better life.
Our task is to revive that radical, empowering conception of heritage; to engage that mass of the public interested in the historic environment and its meaning for them; and to help build a Britain at ease with its present because it understands, values and is able to access its past.
And now I hope you will join me in welcoming on stage the young people of the Castleford Choir.
For more information:
Press Enquiries: 020 7211 6272
Out of hours telephone pager no: 07699 751 153
Public Enquiries: 020 7211 6200
top
|
