Future Monopoly?

[Unitof1]

Shadowy said

quote: OA weren't the largest organisation that expressed an interest in our externalisation. In terms of annual turnover and staffing levels, there was a substantially larger organisation - but the majority of staff, including myself, felt that OA were the only interested body that shared the same work ethic culture, commitment to open archaeology and whose standards were more akin to our own.

I [u]suppose</u> that there were other local competitors (CAU) [u]presumably</u> who did not take an interest or [u]possibly</u> did not share the same work ethic culture. One of those ethics I [u]suppose</u> was to go and work in other counties? I know that the unit has taken up working outside the county but I also know that there was a time when it did not and that it did not really like doing out of county work.

Why I find this worthy of note is the ethic of a county-based organisation turning into something larger and [u]presumably</u> enlarging geographically. From the charity pages Extract from the Central Register of Charities maintained by the Charity Commission for England and Wales for the OA (registration date 1982) says that its

quote: Area of Benefit THE CITY OF OXFORD AND THE SURROUNDING AREA (Area prescribed by Governing Document)

and for Wessex archaeology limited (registered 1983) has a similar local grounding

quote: Area of Benefit BERKSHIRE DORSET HAMPSHIRE ISLE OF WIGHT WILTSHIRE (Area prescribed by Governing Document)

I don#146;t think that this area of benefit means very much, it seems to be defined on the charity pages as

quote: Area of benefit: This is the area that the charity can operate in as set out in its governing document.

and obviously Oxford Wessex have for a long time been working [u]presumably</u> for the benefit of other areas by doing work in other areas (like Cambridge) and/or is it that they have been taking the benefits back to their lairs.


What exactly was the Cambridge unit as a legal definition. why I ask relates to how it could be taken over. My suspicion is that is purely dependent on the state of mind of the personnel and that if anybody had refused to move over, the council could not have done a think about it. But I am way out on my underlined limit. Presumably they are looking forward to working away from home. Externalisation, I suggest that it?s the internals that they are after

[gorilla]

Perhaps it was safeguarding their (CAU personnel) jobs, livelihood and futures that really counted in the end.

Given the choice of working for the big (yes), scary (supposedly)super unit (whatever) or unemployment, I know which one I'd choose

I hate every ape I see,
From chimpan-a to chimpanzee,
You'll never make a monkey out of me!

[gonetopot]

Gorilla: while not wishing to revel in hearsay. The employees I have spoken to (a few in number)are for more worried about their long term futures and 'value to the company' now, than they ever were in the past. Short term it appears little will change but long term re-structuring would appear inevitable. People are very concious of becoming 'a number' and of being asked to travel further if OA east is not going to be working just in Cambs or close to it (as is expected). East Anglia can be a big place.

[Unitof1]

Hayho gorilla I is confused, which one would you choose

The unit that has allowed its self to be externalised by some internal process is the so called Cambridgeshire County Council?s Archaeological Field Unit ? CAM ARC (its had other labels, if it is anything more than a in house county council service level agreement). The Cambridge Archaeology Unit CAU somehow belongs or does not to Cambridge University. You might be right that CAU saw joining CAM ARC as a threat to their jobs, livelihood and futures that really counted in the end. There has been a certain amount of personnel sharing (sanctuary) over the years between the two but I suspect that the main impediment was that a new body could never have decided on which Cambridge to use in a new title (town or gown). There is also the possibility that the status of the CAU was too obscure for CAMARC as its statement of identity is that The Cambridge Archaeological Unit was founded in 1989? and operates out of the Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge.. what ever that means.

[gorilla]

[u]... while not wishing to revel in hearsay. The employees I have spoken to (a few in number)are for more worried about their long term futures and 'value to the company' now, than they ever were in the past. Short term it appears little will change but long term re-structuring would appear inevitable. People are very concious of becoming 'a number' and of being asked to travel further if OA east is not going to be working just in Cambs or close to it (as is expected). East Anglia can be a big place.</u>

I agree gonetopot. We are [u]all</u> concerned about our very own and/or company futures - where will I be in a few days / weeks / years time? No, I haven't spoken to anyone from the aforesaid unit and so operate from a very distant viewpoint. But I've seen it all before... and been there too.
"To keep the money coming in, pay the bills and actually eat something this week (and retain some sanity) shall I take that three-week poorly paid contract trowelling mud in Sludgetown (my neighbourhood) and, also on the hope that they (the powers that be) employ me again, or do I take that lucrative, six-month contract raking the crud on an away-stay in Bogsville?"
"Sorry darling, I may be away some time... see you when I get back. I may have made just enough money to keep the bailiffs at bay for another week or so. Look after yourself and make sure you feed my cat"
Hmmmm... I just don't know (choices, choices)

All I'm trying to say is (without wanting to get bogged down in the nitty gritty details of all this)... it's becoming a stark choice between immediate work (or work wherever you can get it) or immediate unemployment.

But then again, it's been like that for years... and will always be (irrespective of what you want to argue and how you want to argue it)

I hate every ape I see,
From chimpan-a to chimpanzee,
You'll never make a monkey out of me!

[RedEarth]

quote:Originally posted by Unitof1

Why I find this worthy of note is the ethic of a county-based organisation turning into something larger and [u]presumably</u> enlarging geographically.

I always find the definition of some/certain or even all archaeological companies as charities a bit tenuous, especially given the size and apparently overtly commercially driven nature of a lot of what they do. It seems to convey a lot of benefits that other organisations, that are not charities, are not eligble for, with few obvious down sides. The size of some of the larger units also seems totally at odds with charitable status - a bit like Oxfam opening a shop the size of your average Tesco. I never quite understood what being an 'educational charity' actually means in real terms.

[Unitof1]

But the ethics Apeman.

Those units that have become the big boys and presumably will continue to grow, possibly until they don?t have to do Groundwork?s together, by working away from home, having started off with local centric council remits (and funding which is still in place) as can be seem by the remnant mission statements I have referred to. In the main they got into the charity set up early (in 1980s) which I suggest was a manoeuvre mainly intended to contain the liabilities of permanent civil service employment, such as pensions, to a few top employees. Camarc (RIP) presumably wishes that it had applied to the charity commission ages ago. Those in carmac (RIP) should be worried as they were not externalised for their work away ethic (so why were they of such great interest for the great educational charity that calls itself exhome of heads of eh)

Camarc (RIP) has given up its last adherence to the local regional ethic, presumably something that it should have done back in the eighties. In some ways it has also given up the last vestiges of the idea of a local monopoly born out of county delineations that has implications for other setups in the East Anglian region.

The idea of a local monopoly is now left as a curatorial issue. One advantage that a local monopoly held was presumably local Competence, something that curators should prefer but which in reality is probably very hard to define, shown by the illegal local contractor lists mentioned in ppg16/ifa standards now withdrawn. I would like to think that local knowledge is an advantage but it is not something that can or should be monopolised but it is the only thing that somebody who would prefer to work at [u]home</u> would hold on to. One area that a vestige of local competence is remaining if not being expanded is in so called specialist credentials where some curators are I think trying to enforce a convoluted list of publication and peer review, which is little more than the local contractor list. Is this a curatorial response to generalist commercial entities and maybe this is the future way of assured local dominance? As a subject it also skirts around the funding and charitable purpose of local and regional museums.

Redearth could you go a little further and say that they were obscene disgrace to archaeology and/or to charities. Youll feel better.

[Unitof1]

Redeart I think that you have the snake by the tail but I dont think that you can get enough education to understand what an educational charity is though

quote: a bit like Oxfam opening a shop the size of your average Tesco.

unfortunately the Charities Act is so new that this issue of what those charities are doing and what they are up to is more than likely alright

I have tried following this google from the

Joint Committee on the Draft Charities Bill

quote:There are, currently, three main types of trading by charities:

a) Primary purpose trading - i.e., trading in the course of actually carrying out the primary purpose of the charity: for example, charging for admission to an exhibition by a charitable art gallery;

b) Ancillary trading - i.e., trading linked to and carried out at the same time as carrying out the primary purpose of a charity: for example, sales from a bar run by a theatre charity for members of the audience;

c) Non-primary purpose trading - i.e., trading with the sole or main aim of raising funds: for example, some charity shops or charity mail order catalogues.

with the interpretation of

quote: In regard to (i) primary purpose trading and (ii) ancillary trading, charities both have the power to trade and are exempt from income tax on any profits from trading.

In regard to (iii) non-primary purpose trading, the situation is more complex. If the income from this type of trading is small or incidental - i.e., ?5,000 or less than 25% of the charity's total income (up to a maximum of ?50,000) - then the charity both has the power to trade and is exempt from income tax on trading profits. However, a charity can get around this restriction by setting up a separate trading company to carry on trading; the trading company can then transfer its profits back to the charity under the Gift Aid scheme, so that no tax is paid on them. There are some disadvantages to doing this: mainly that it results in additional paperwork.

I am saving the chasing of this for a really sunning day whilst on holiday to pursue. I have seen the gift aid device used somewhere in the midlands but there is nothing here that says that they cannot set up a Tescos if they want to. Presumably Tescos have other methods to stop them

[drpeterwardle]

Unit of 1 said:

"In the main they got into the charity set up early (in 1980s) which I suggest was a manoeuvre mainly intended to contain the liabilities of permanent civil service employment, such as pensions, to a few top employees. Camarc (RIP) presumably wishes that it had applied to the charity commission ages ago."

Not true. These units were all set up in the seventies and being a charity was the obvious move rather than a company in the climate of the times. Unitof1 and others clearly were not involved in the real Rescue era when it was predicted that by the year 2000 the only archaeological sites left would be those owned by the National Trust. Rescue's logo was Stonehenge in a bucket of a bulldozer.

There are many things that can be said about the 1970s and the establishment of the unit system but the one thing that cannot be criticised is the motives of people - it was simply to rescue archaeology before it was too late.

The context of the times has to be remembered 50% of the population were in state employment. Even Thomas Cooks was a government owned company. More details can be found in my 2006 BAJR paper.

Dr Peter Wardle

[RedEarth]

quote:Originally posted by Unitof1
Redearth could you go a little further and say that they were obscene disgrace to archaeology and/or to charities. Youll feel better.

I'm not sure I could go that far but this whole topic raises several issues about the larger units. It's hard to see how archaeology in the developer funded sector can become more - what's the word, professiony? Professionist? Professional, that's the one - with large numbers of people working for charities. Where's the insentive when any sort of bonus for your commitment that might be on offer is swallowed up by the larger charitable remit (if I understand it correctly, I prepare to be shot down in flames!)? The whole concept of a charity seems to fly in the face of acceptable opportunities for everyone working at such companies.

Also, with regard to companies working in large areas, obviously certain sizes of project can only be carried out by a certain number of projects, but if projects can be won in areas at some distance from a unit (any unit, I'm not naming names!) then something is getting squeezed quite badly somewhere. Even on travel costs alone, particularly as they continue to go up, this doesn't make a lot of sense. I think there's a lot to be said for local knowledge; if nothing else it would help eliminate the sort of identikit reports that are produced by people working outside of familiar territory.

Just thought that smiley face was looking a bit bored