C O N T E X T 1 0 5 : J U LY 2 0 0 8 49 Company, and with a reception sponsored by the IHBC through our 10th anniversary fund, the two days represented the kind of interactive partnering of diverse interests on which conservation flourishes. NHTG is a part of the construction industry’s sector skills council, ConstructionSkills. Its research represents a new awareness in the industry of the potential of how proper care and improvement of traditional build – that is, conservation – are an integral part of the sector as a whole, and have a huge potential to address the operational and environmental challenges already identified by the skills council. The excellent joint introduction to the reports, by the CEO of ConstructionSkills, Peter Lobban, and NHTG chair, Mike Moody, summarises this awareness. ‘Our built heritage – the six million or so UK pre-1919 buildings – is a vital and vibrant part of the built environment,’ they write. ‘Understanding and caring for this important inheritance requires professionals and craftspeople well versed in traditional building methods and materials and with a sound knowledge of the approach to and techniques of conservation, repair, maintenance and restoration…’ Lobban and Moody continue: ‘We also need to ensure that the conservation, repair and maintenance (CRM) sector of the construction industry – of which traditional buildings form a considerable part – continues to be linked to the sustainability, regeneration, energy efficiency and climate change agendas. In so doing, we must educate clients in this wider CRM sector of the correct methods and materials for conservation, repair and maintenance by using examples of best practice and disseminating published information, advice and guidance.’ With this awareness of conservation principles coming from the heart of the construction industry, I think we can say a big ‘well done’ to those leading the initiative. They are too many to mention even only the IHBC members involved.You know who you are. Also on 30 April, at the same time as this sector-shaping training partnership was progressing in London, our national office and Wales branch were joining with the Civic Trust for Wales and Cadw, the national heritage agency, to orchestrate a new engagement with the historic environments sector in Wales. This took place at a conference at the Millennium Centre in Cardiff, ‘Treftadaeth 08’. The event is part of a wider process intended to bring the historic environment ‘into focus’, as the title suggests, centred on consultation over a new historic environment strategic statement, drafted by Cadw in partnership with key stakeholders, including volunteers from the IHBC. The enthusiastic lead of the Civic Trust for Wales in managing the operations, and the dedicated support of Cadw and its staff, as well as the strategic advice of our own branch, secured a hugely successful launch. Details of the progress will be available on our website. Finally, on 30 April we also had one of our major branch events, organised by the South West Branch in Bristol, examining energy efficiency in historic buildings. This was the second iteration of a day of talks already held on 24 April in Plymouth. At Bristol, the national office provided an enabling booking management service for the branch, taking away the tedium of paperwork and finances, and allowing branch volunteers to do what is most rewarding: developing training events and programmes that respond to the needs of the professionals in their region. It is a pilot of how the national office can support branches.We will be looking in further detail at this strategy as the year progresses. So from London, to Bristol, to Cardiff, over the two days from 29 April, the IHBC was leading and partnering training in conservation education, policy and practice, with some 300 professionals and stakeholders – regional, national and international – learning at events shaped by us both as regards programme and process. At Cardiff, our president David Lovie, and vice-chair Sheila Stones represented the national office. In London Dave Chetwyn, chairman, John Preston, education secretary, and Stuart Eydmann, vice-chair of the education committee and a leading light in the institute’s engagement with accreditation, all spoke at the reception in the Carpenters’ Hall. Clearly, the IHBC is picking up speed in our activities.We are already working beyond capacity and always in need of help, so if you are interested in volunteering, please let us know. The website will provide details, or contact our membership services officer, Devon DeCelles. Finally, to round off our busy progress, we have just launched our new home page for our website, a mixture of blog and news that we hope will evolve into a whole new resource for the sector and, not least, become an invaluable and enabling tool for our members’ professional practice. Not only will we use this to post sectorrelevant updates, but the wider sector and public can send in reports that, where sufficiently relevant, can reach our news page. At the same time our members (and the press) can subscribe to a service that will provide email reminders when news is posted, so they need not interrupt their ordinary work activities to keep up to date with current key issues across the sector. And all this is before I get to our recent outputs: the newYearbook and Context; the actions linked to the NHTG action plan; the transfer of our chair of the Urban Design Alliance to the RTPI; the annual school and AGM arrangements and papers; the joint response to the draft Heritage Bill from the DCMS; the progress with the membership drive (we are approaching 2,000 members); commitments on brownfield strategies; reports on information strategies; the interbranch competition for attracting new members; and much more. It has been a busy few months, and with planning including the annual school, a council meeting and seminar in Belfast, new guidance for prospective members, and lobbying on the legislation all forthcoming, the busy quarter is set to continue. Seán O’Reilly, [email protected]
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