Is our heritage at risk?

What causes prehistoric burial mounds gradually to disappear? What makes ruined castles and abbeys crumble? What constitutes a serious threat to a historic park or the site of a 17th century shipwreck? English Heritage is sharpening its tools for the protection of England’s heritage at risk. It is creating the first all-encompassing register of the country’s neglected or decaying historic treasures and introducing new ways to save them.

Its Heritage At Risk project, to be launched on Tuesday 8 July 2008, will make England the only country in Europe to have a comprehensive knowledge of the state of its protected heritage and the analysis to save this precious and finite resource for the future.

The Heritage At Risk initiative is based on the success of English Heritage’s Buildings at Risk Register. Published annually since 1998, this Register has transformed the approach taken by English Heritage itself, the other conservation bodies, local authorities and owners to saving Grade I and Grade II* listed buildings. The new Heritage At Risk Register aims to extend this winning formula to Grade II buildings, scheduled monuments, archaeology, historic landscapes, parks and gardens, places of worship, conservation areas, battlefields and even designated maritime wrecks, in fact any and every bit of England’s protected heritage which is deemed to be at risk of loss through decay or damage.

For the first phase of the project, English Heritage experts have added to their knowledge of the country’s 30,687 Grade I and Grade II* listed buildings an assessment of all 19,711 of the country’s scheduled monuments, all 1,595 of its registered historic parks, gardens and landscapes, all 43 if its registered battlefields and all 45 of the protected wrecks off our coasts. They have come to a view on how many of these national treasures are at risk and, most importantly, why, and will publish the results on 8th July in the form of a summary document and a register.

Dr Simon Thurley, Chief Executive of English Heritage, said: “Even in its first year, our Heritage At Risk project will constitute the most detailed picture ever gathered of the true state of the nation’s heritage. Year on year we will be able to see how much of this heritage has been rescued and how much is still at risk. The Heritage At Risk project is at the heart of what English Heritage does, identifying what is important and in danger and devising ways to save it.

“This very ambitious systematic survey of heritage at risk will enable us to prioritise the most urgent cases and save more of them, more quickly. Seeing the whole picture, we will be able to identify solutions which can be applied across the whole country.

“The long barrow overgrown with brambles that you saw on your last country walk, the Civil War battlefield under threat of development, the broken war memorial in the village square or the boarded-up old mill buildings that no-one seems to care about, these are all part of the rich backdrop of our lives in England. But our heritage is a finite resource and if we don’t act, these things won’t be here for our grandchildren.

“Most owners of heritage sites in England do a fantastic job of looking after them but it is a difficult task. Heritage At Risk is not a name and shame exercise. The new register will focus everyone’s attention on the neediest cases, bringing the owners, councils and others together and harnessing the nation’s huge enthusiasm for its rich, varied but sometimes fragile past.”

The launch of Heritage At Risk is sponsored by Ecclesiastical Insurance. Ecclesiastical has been working with English Heritage for more than 20 years across various initiatives and will collaborate with us to see where shared research and data can give greater depth to the Heritage At Risk project.