6th January 2011, 06:27 PM
Every single MSC post I held was waivered (ie I didn't have to have been unemployed for six months) - staff posts above the basic 3-day-a-week job-creation end usually were, not many archaeologists back then tended to sit around on their arses being unemployed for 6 months at a time when they could go out and 'vol' for even less!
The joy of MSC (and indeed DoE) funding was the shear number of big archaeology projects running - none of my current crew have ever worked on a project with even 50 people on site, let alone 100 plus, those were the happy days when you could wait for a break in the weather and trowel the WHOLE SITE up for some piccies with enough sunlight left.
There was certainly a perception around the circuit in the late 80s that MSC was funding well over a half of British archaeology - anyone got any figures on expenditure still floating around or has all that sort of stuff long since been shredded?
And of course MSC introduced a slightly more varied mix into the workforce, not just mass-produced archaeology graduates, with an equally varied and valuable skill set - there certainly seemed to be more diggers with driving licences in those days (what is this thing with people not being able to drive, am sure a disproportionately small number of diggers hold a licence compared to the general population), plant drivers, etc. etc, and 'reformed' burglers were always handy when locked out of the cabin! ....what proportion of today's unit managers started as MSC? - I can think of several
The joy of MSC (and indeed DoE) funding was the shear number of big archaeology projects running - none of my current crew have ever worked on a project with even 50 people on site, let alone 100 plus, those were the happy days when you could wait for a break in the weather and trowel the WHOLE SITE up for some piccies with enough sunlight left.
There was certainly a perception around the circuit in the late 80s that MSC was funding well over a half of British archaeology - anyone got any figures on expenditure still floating around or has all that sort of stuff long since been shredded?
And of course MSC introduced a slightly more varied mix into the workforce, not just mass-produced archaeology graduates, with an equally varied and valuable skill set - there certainly seemed to be more diggers with driving licences in those days (what is this thing with people not being able to drive, am sure a disproportionately small number of diggers hold a licence compared to the general population), plant drivers, etc. etc, and 'reformed' burglers were always handy when locked out of the cabin! ....what proportion of today's unit managers started as MSC? - I can think of several