28th May 2012, 01:21 PM
I would say legislation is the problem.
The construction industry always (well usually) does the minimum it has to, including breaking rules if paying the occasional fine is less than doing the work.
They think nothing of spending millions of pounds on things they are forced to.
Archaeology is see as a joke in the higher circles of power that control the industry. It is not valued as its too easy to get away with not doing it. They get no return, except the occasional good press.
If however a government actually bothered to legislate properly, like they do for things like water management, noise, fire safety, building regs, pollution, public consultation etc etc, then archaeology would be valued, costed for and taken seriously.
The pay and conditions problem stems from this, as no one stops the cowboys making a profit from shoddy work (its easy to not find any archaeology) or not paying staff properly (those students are studying archaeology, they can dig it for a fraction of the cost).
The construction industry always (well usually) does the minimum it has to, including breaking rules if paying the occasional fine is less than doing the work.
They think nothing of spending millions of pounds on things they are forced to.
Archaeology is see as a joke in the higher circles of power that control the industry. It is not valued as its too easy to get away with not doing it. They get no return, except the occasional good press.
If however a government actually bothered to legislate properly, like they do for things like water management, noise, fire safety, building regs, pollution, public consultation etc etc, then archaeology would be valued, costed for and taken seriously.
The pay and conditions problem stems from this, as no one stops the cowboys making a profit from shoddy work (its easy to not find any archaeology) or not paying staff properly (those students are studying archaeology, they can dig it for a fraction of the cost).