Historic Environment Scotland Act: Secondary Legislation

As the distinction in status between ‘listing’ and ‘scheduling’ is rather opaque, it is unclear why HES will only consult on proposals to list, not on proposals to schedule. In order that the process be transparent and the decision makers accountable, all decisions and proposals should be publicly accessible for comments.

We feel that the categories of ‘scheduled monument’ and ‘listed building’ are somewhat archaic hangovers from former government agencies that previously dealt with the historic environment. There is the implication that the historic environment is divided between archaeology and architectural history. There is also the suggestion that the public can only comment on the latter subject.
We observe that ‘historic environment’ includes ‘designed landscapes’, which come under the remit of HES buildings inspectorate, as well as some historic places, such as battlefields, which have no buildings or significant archaeological remains, but are scheduled monuments. Meanwhile, the international cultural heritage approach is increasingly tending towards using the single category of ‘historic places’.
Furthermore, the diagram on page 9 has been drawn in a way that is misleading about the validation process.

We agree that all HES planning applications and decisions should be published, as should the decision-making process and relevant information, such as conservation management plans and statements of significance.

We believe that the current ‘provisional view’ is a valuable part of preliminary discussions, and should be retained, therefore. The diagram on page 9 demonstrates that those SMC applications, which are not validated, are effectively invisible to the public and remain part of a purely internal process.

We are concerned that the process of validating LBC/CAC applications and the consequent progression of these applications is completely lacking in third party involvement or consultation with specialist/expert, community, or other stakeholder groups.

We agree with the localist approach. However, the system requires a process for public/community engagement over and above the involvement of the local authority. For instance, the government could maintain a publicly accessible online portal containing all the current information on LBC and CAC applications nationally, which could link to all of the local authority planning portals, creating a standard format for these individual portals. These registers would be searchable by filters using different criteria, such as building type, building age/construction period. A notification system, for e.g. by email, would greatly assist stakeholder groups to actively engage with and support the heritage planning process.

We are uncertain what this question means.

While it is clearly intended that the DPEA will be superior to HES in this process, this can hardly be supported without evidence to show what type of expertise the DPEA might possess and what framework of criteria would be used. Of course, common sense would suggest that HES should possess such expertise and use such criteria, in the first instance. Thus one would conclude that the DPEA is primarily a means of defraying ministerial responsibility.

Third party expert consultation would have more democratic credibility here. Again we would question why there should be different categories/processes for monuments and buildings. Regarding the basis for grounds for appeal, clarification is required as to what is ‘traditional’ and how this relates to international conservation charters and standards. There appears to be a lack of such important criteria as ‘architectural interest’ and ‘technological development’

Again, we advocate third party expertise.

We would desire to see further consultation on this matter, once drafts have been developed. We observe that the Scottish Ministers’ estate of historic properties is an unplanned collection, resulting from historic exigencies, while lacking any coherent policy of acquisition. We would like to see a review of the estate and development of a ‘collections’ approach reflecting all centuries of Scottish culture, up to the present.

Diagrams could be improved and corrected, possibly with the use of flow charts.

Undecided. Community engagement should be better embedded in the system, with public access to all information about the historic environment. Guidance and training fore stakeholder groups should be provided to improve their effectiveness and excellence in contributing to the heritage planning process.

We trust that these comments, made in good faith, will prove useful.