46 C O N T E X T 1 3 4 : M A Y 2 0 1 4 TONY CALLADINE Assessment for listing The Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013’s changes to the Planning (Listed Building and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 should provide greater clarity to the process. When the listing of structures and buildings began in 1947, the list entry address was most important. The description was simply a means of helping to identify the site in question, for the avoidance of doubt. Thus nowadays when we come to look at a great many earlier entries, they seem rather thin and lacking in information. Famously, the description for the cathedral church at Canterbury is a carefully wrought piece of prose of seven sentences (NHLE entry 1336823).There are some who would applaud such brevity in list entries, believing that it allows for the best conservation management of the building by leaving interpretation of special interest to the English Heritage inspector or conservation officer, and that to go further leads to an overly detailed description and thereby an overly tight prescription for protection. In more recent times a number of factors have led to a different approach. The debate surrounding heritage protection reform, from 2003 onwards, was in part concerned with opening up the opaque world of designation – answering a call from beyond the heritage sector, and from government, for greater clarity in the process, and in what protection means. Prototype heritage partnership agreements were promoted, building upon the model of the agreement for theWillis Coroon Building in Ipswich in 2003. English Heritage encouraged listing advisers to identify in list entries the areas of especial sensitivity, when appropriate, and reasons for designation were added to both the advice to government and in the list entry itself – an at-a-glance guide to what makes up the special interest. Such clearer list entries not only engage the interest of the owner, but also help the local authority in conveying just where special interest resides. From around 2005, therefore, list entries and English Heritage advice began more often to include comments on where interest particularly lay, and also on areas of no special interest. For not-listable sites, a note on the possibility of local interest might be included – although, of course the final word here is for the local authority. These developments were felt by local authorities to be helpful, and owners too welcomed the greater clarity. Technically, however, the requirement for listed building consent was still determined by the statutory force of the address, and any qualifying word in the description carried disputable weight. Latterly both the Penfold Review and the Better Regulation agenda lent weight towards further change.The Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act (ERRA) 2013 made changes to the Planning (Listed Building and Conservation Areas) Kesteven and Grantham Girls School, 1910, by HH Dunn. Being the school where Margaret Thatcher was head girl, a good deal of its significance lies in the historical interest of the association with her. Modern additions were excluded from protection when it was listed in 2013. (Photo: English Heritage)
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