31st March 2012, 05:50 PM
kevin wooldridge Wrote:...in reality though, even if curatorial services are located within local authority set-ups, many are charging for 'on demand' services, in nearly all cases to private developers and in many cases to archaeological organisations requiring data for commercial purposes. Isn't that in effect commercial funding?
Although probably semantics we're not allowed to charge for the information contained within the HER - it is considered to be in the public realm. What we charge for (in our case at an hourly rate) is for the officer time that is taken to carry out searches and collate the information.
A contractor or developer would be welcome to come to the HER and gather the information themselves, but in reality it is generally more cost effective to pay for an hour of HER officer time. Not strictly commercial funding, but cost recovery