3rd September 2006, 07:00 PM
In one county where the development control team are based in a commercial unit I attended a meeting with the curator and my client and had to sit through the curatorial archaeologist marketing the services of the local unit to my client whilst sat right in front of me. I later wrote a complaint letter to the County Archaeologist about this and never even received a reply.
Practices of this type just should not happen it gives the entire profession a bad name. However I do think that there is a good and strong argument for maintaining units with a strong regional or county basis that are self-funding and may be managed as part of a local authority. Many of these organisations have staff that have worked in the county for many years and basically know the place and there is a strong argument for preserving this knowledge. The management, and financial base of these organisations, their locations and staff should be entirely separate and be seen to be entirely separate and probably should not even have a similar name.
Practices of this type just should not happen it gives the entire profession a bad name. However I do think that there is a good and strong argument for maintaining units with a strong regional or county basis that are self-funding and may be managed as part of a local authority. Many of these organisations have staff that have worked in the county for many years and basically know the place and there is a strong argument for preserving this knowledge. The management, and financial base of these organisations, their locations and staff should be entirely separate and be seen to be entirely separate and probably should not even have a similar name.