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Unitof1 Wrote:How did your specification that you tendered for come about. At which point in the planning cycle?
Post-determination, as part of a condition on planning consent. The curator had asked for a condition to be attached, and prepared a specification for the work. This was passed to the developer by the planner, who then sent it out to various companies asking for a price to undertake the initial evaluation, obviously with the usual caveats about further costs should significant archaeology be found that would require a further phase of mitigation. The various companies invited to tender submitted bids to the developer, who presumably selected someone based on cost.
I don't know whether this supports your argument or mine, but you did ask!
You know Marcus. He once got lost in his own museum
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GnomeKing Wrote:I love your passion for standards and guidance!
Oh for f**k's sake!
It's not a passion for standards and guidance, it's a concern that work is done to a reasonable standard so that archaeology is not needlessly trashed. I think that to achieve this it's helpful to have some formal guidance against which this can be judged, you obviously don't. We'll just have to disagree on that one, then.
You know Marcus. He once got lost in his own museum
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26th May 2011, 02:33 PM
(This post was last modified: 26th May 2011, 03:23 PM by GnomeKing.)
I love guidance and standards done properly. wow.
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GnomeKing Wrote:I love guidance and standards done properly. wow.
Love your passion for sarcasm. Wow
You know Marcus. He once got lost in his own museum
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Brody I apologise you have been baited by my short hand reference to your words which were (now I know that you are north of the boarder I will slow the pace down)
Quote:[SIZE=3]when tendering for work
, -Quote:you'd know that each HER would be following the same proceedure, which would be codified in the guidance document, and so would be transparent to the outside user.
[/SIZE]
I could not imagine a tendering situation in which HERs would be involved in the tender or two HERs or what needs codifying in a guidence. That an HER might produce a brief I understand (not that that’s in pss5) but they don’t conduct the tender. Where the HERs are screwing the tenders is by producing evaluation briefs post determination. It seems to me that if they require an evaluation post determination then according to pps5 they did not get adequate information with the application so could not have accepted the application.
Basically the development is a fait accompli and the archaeologist has to spend time researching the unknown without an evaluation and fitting that quote into the developers timetable..now I live for evaluations and my problem is getting to clients pre application…..
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I may not have made myself particularly clear in relation to what I think the benefits would be if there were standards in place for what a HER should and shouldn't do. Basically, the main one would be a greater degree of consistency across the country, so you'd know that each HER should be following the same processes. In your case, Unit, I assume that you'd be in favour of standards that said that evaluation should be required pre-determination - if this was the case, but the HER (or more realistically, the planner) decided that post-det evaluation was OK, you'd be able to say 'hold on there, you're not acting in accordance with the IFA guidelines'.
Similarly, I'd like to see something that sets out standards for accessing information held in the HER, so that you'd know in advance what you'll be charged for and what you're entitled to see for free, rather than the current mish-mash and piecemeal approach - again, if a HER attempts to charge for access to information that the guidance document says should be freely available, then you can point to the standards and ask why they're not acting in accordance with them.
I'd also like to see something that sets out in black and white the divisions that should be in place if one organisation is acting as both curator and contractor - this arguement was rehearsed on another thread, and I know I didn't have a lot of support, but I've never been comfortable with the situation where one company is both specifying the level of work while at the same time tendering for it. However, I think it may be more of a problem in the future, as in-house services are shut down and commercial companies move into the role of running HERs. Indeed, this is perhaps one reason for the IFA attempting to put these standards in place now - with the various cuts to Council services, a document that sets out what a HER should do may be important in ensuring than any HER functions outsourced to private companies continue to be provided to the same service-levels. Basically, it could help prevent Councils from cutting HERs if they know that any private company taking on the work would have to meet the same standards, which would likely mean the same amount of time and potentially the same cost.
Apologies to Gnomeking is this post is insufficiently PASSIONATE:face-stir:
You know Marcus. He once got lost in his own museum
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26th May 2011, 08:08 PM
(This post was last modified: 26th May 2011, 08:10 PM by GnomeKing.)
accepted MBB)
"something that sets out in black and white the divisions that should be in place if one organisation is acting as both curator and contractor" :face-approve:
" it could help prevent Councils from cutting HERs if they know that any private company taking on the work would have to meet the same standards, which would likely mean the same amount of time and potentially the same cost. " :face-thinks: ... an argument with wider applications re privatisation (pirate-isation)?
"benefits would be if there were standards in place for what a HER should and shouldn't do. Basically, the main one would be a greater degree of consistency across the country" :face-crying:...more bureaucracy, and less adjustment to local situation and needs....?
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GnomeKing Wrote:"benefits would be if there were standards in place for what a HER should and shouldn't do. Basically, the main one would be a greater degree of consistency across the country" :face-crying:...more bureaucracy, and less adjustment to local situation and needs....?
There's a danger, I suppose, that it could restrict some freedom to adjust to local situations, but in reality I think any guidance document is unlikely to specify to that level of detail. I'd expect it to be at a fairly high level - as I said before, I'd anticipate that the aim will be to establish a minimum set of criteria as to what a HER should be doing and how it should be interacting with its users in areas such as data access. In that way, any organisation that doesn't meet these standards can be pulled up, while any HER that already meets or exceeds them is unlikely to need to make any changes to the way it operates. I'd hope that the end result would be a general levelling-up of HERs, while not restricting the ability of those who already provide a good service to carry on with what they're doing.
I agree with you re: privatisation though
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"I know I didn't have a lot of support, but I've never been comfortable with the situation where one company is both specifying the level of work while at the same time tendering for it"
Agreed! I received an eval specification sent by a regular client and prepared by a county arch (who shall remain nameless) a few months ago. At the back of the spec said county arch had included a price to undertake the work. Apart from being a pretty naive act, not to say reckless, the price was so low it wouldn't have covered the plant costs, never mind an actual archie to watch it. Makes you wonder how much more flexible these characters are to quality of work when it comes to 'their own'. Pretty sure we'd have been dragged over the coals if we'd got the job...
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why all the talk of HERs? There are standards for HERs already, covering all manner of aspects and overarching documents such as
http://www.ifp-plus.info/ . blah blah blah
