Who gets to work in MY county

[Martin Locock]

Although the idea of financial checks seems attractive, I'm not sure it will achieve the desired end. The standard accountant's measures of financial performance give little real guide about the likelihood that a business will fail, while discriminating against small or new businesses.

If Cambridgeshire is demanding financial information it should be upfront about how it will be used. I suspect that they ask for information without any necessary intent to look at it in any serious way.

[gonetopot]

I believe Marcus Brody is on the right track here. Cambridgeshire has one of the highest numbers of contracting units working in it of any county from the largest established units to the smallest one and two man new companies. I haven't come across any barriers to work in the county to date, including for new small units, who are asked to provide CVs etc to show they have the requisite experience. The county has numerous large sites awaiting publication from various units so obviously they are anxious to see this happen, but the county archaeologists are approachable and full of helpful, good advice, so I think the criticism of the technical language in the advice and their right to check is a little harsh.

[vulpes]

Well done for spotting this BAJR :face-approve:

Looks like Cllr Melton may have had a point after all!! :face-stir:

[vulpes]

Seriously though, like others I find little to object to in this. It seems that the curators in Cambs are not so much trying to restrict trade in the county as trying to secure the archaeological resource for the people of Cambs. Which after all is what they are employed to do. :face-approve:

Also, as far as I'm aware they've been applying this policy for several years with no real difficulties legal or otherwise. I'd take it as read that legal advice was sought and taken prior to this being introduced.

[zephyr]

This type of document could have the effect of blocking new archaeological contractors/sole traders, more and more of which are appearing due to redundancies, lay offs.

A new contractor may be very experienced but because they are new cannot meet some of the requirements requested, for exaple, they've been trading for a week and have not made any money yet and so its difficult to get a letter of financial integrity, or do not have any reports under their own company name to submit to a curator.

It can be a chicken and egg situation.

[BAJR]

I would hope that work carried out for other companies, with your name on it would be acceptable. again though we come to the financial aspect. Surely that is up to the client not the council... unless it is a council contract. ?

[BAJR]

This is all good discussion . and that is what must happen. What must be created is a system that is applied acoross the board, is reasonable and as Vulpes says... protects the archaeology. and ensures publication.

HAving to do this in each place with each curator is tricksome. Critique of technical language is important IF this is being applied to archaeologists but not to architects (for example) --- I would want to see quality and a record of ability - but I would take care in (even unintentionally) that tells the developer that ...

Developers are of course at liberty to select any archaeological contractor to undertake their
work. However...............

and then goes on to mention RO status lists, and contractors that have been

formally acknowledged by the County Archaeology Officers, advisors to the Local Planning Authority

So... Developer... you have a choice.... you can choose anyone you want apart from those that the council has not approved - which we must have a list of. (given that to be allowed to work in the county you must be approved by them) .. but for some reason...

neither maintains nor provides an approved list of recommended archaeological contractors for distribution to clients in Cambridgeshire, referring them instead to the list of Registered Organisations prepared by the Institute for Archaeologists.

[Dinosaur]

On the reporting/publication front, has anyone got any evidence that significant numbers of developments have ever in reality failed to get signed off just because the archaeology wasn't published? I can think of jobs where we, the contractor, have forced stuff through (pay your bill or you don't get the report) but few where curators (usually EH inspectors, actually) have really flexed their muscles, but that might just be my own personal experience. Developers tend to be cooperative up to the point where they've manged to get the ******archaeologists off their site and can build something, then they need to have their fingers battered to a pulp to prize any further cash away from them to carry out proper px and I've certainly worked on a few projects where the county has never found the spine to keep chasing them to take stuff to publication - I've got a lump of strat Roman town (+20k juicy finds) which after ten years has never got past PX assessment and probably never will since the then curator decided to run and hide, and theres a big chunk of my pet quarry which was done in the '90s by another company (under the same curator as it happens) who've only ever produced one of those minimalist PX assessments (in 1997) that just says 'Yup, we found this much stuff and it needs to go to analysis' - which of course is F-all use to anyone if no further work is forced through the system.

I'll say one thing, seem to be spending a lot more time thinking about curatorial-type things since I've been playing on here, u think an hour a day on BAJR ought to be made compulsory industry wide? - or would we get too many entries for the caption competitions?

[Dinosaur]

Eek, I seem to have just become a Grand High thingumygig without warning! - that mean I have to go all sensible?

[gonetopot]

Dinosaur - Cambs have in recent times refused to sign off the condition on projects until publication reports have been produced. Obviously building work may have gone ahead, but the legal condition remains. Of all counties I have worked in, they are the only ones to insist on this.