CONTEXT 180 : JUNE 2024 33 WHERE HERITAGE AND NATURE MEET grounds of Levens Hall in Cumbria. Or the dangers might be more insidious, such as those relating to the dramatic fall in the number of gardening staff available for attending historic planting schemes. Not untypical was the example of the head gardener interviewed by John Cornforth when he was researching his 1974 study on the state of Britain’s country houses. Where the head gardener had begun his career in a team of 25 gardeners, he was now in a team of just three. The importance of the landscape settings of historic houses was eventually recognised through the fiscal changes of the mid-1970s. The incoming Labour administration faced intense lobbying from the HHA and others, to ease the tax burdens facing the owners of this kind of heritage. The law was changed to enable the conditional exemption of houses, as well as landscapes, against capital transfer tax (the new name for estate duty). Previously, such exemptions had only been available for artworks. Now it was possible to exempt a house against a capital tax charge on death, provided that this heritage was opened to public access for a certain minimum period every year. Lobbying from the early HHA, among others, ensured that this exemption was later made available for historic parks and gardens, too. This conditional exemption option has arguably saved around 300 houses from being separated from their landscapes and from being sold for development or for being repurposed into other uses. The other necessity was a commitment from the owner to ensure that this heritage was being properly maintained and managed. This has given rise to the requirement for heritage management plans (HMPs) for those parks and gardens that now fall under the terms of conditional exemption. An HMP provides a statement of the significance of a landscape and its relationship to the house. Such plans also detail the public access that is to be offered at the site, usually a minimum of 28 days as a minimum, but also including an insistence on a certain number of weekends and bank holidays across the months from spring and summer to early autumn. Importantly, an HMP that is written specifically for conditional exemption shows how an owner will maintain and preserve the heritage property in the condition that helped it to be granted its tax-exempt status. A baseline survey of condition is the most important part of the heritage maintenance plan, the most time-consuming for professionals and the most expensive element. It is a snapshot in time and a basis for monitoring that the buildings and landscapes are being conserved into the future in at least the same condition. Today, Historic Houses advises its member places that this baseline survey may identify certain repairs Holkham Hall, Norfolk, lies at the centre of 25,000 acres of park and agricultural land.
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