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MORE than 110,000 people took to the streets yesterday in a mass protest against Government cuts. Campaigners chanted, sang and waved placards and balloons as they marched in
Glasgow, London and Belfast to call for an end to austerity measures. The
A Future That Works march called for changes in economic policies and gave out the message that austerity is simply failing, the Government is making life desperately hard for millions of people because of pay cuts for
workers, while the rich are given tax cuts (Lauren Crooks, 'Thousands join protests across UK in bid to stop Con-Dem cuts and protect their future', The Daily Record and Sunday Mail 21st October 2012).
This has a portable antiquities context too. regular followers of the antiquitist blogosphere will be aware that the austerity measures in European states such as Greece, Spain and Italy have been prompting the leading pro-collecting lobbyists in the US to predict that the end of state custodianship of the archaeological heritage will be coming to an end. For example, one analyst, based on information from MSN and Fox News sees the future of Europe and its cultural heritage in entirely black, if not apocalyptic tones:
Greece: Greek voters deal blow to parties that have govern..., The Collapse of Cultural Property Nationalism, Say your prayers': Attempts to form new Greek gove..., Greeks withdraw $894 million in a day: Is this beg..., Facing Reality, Greek Archaeologists Out of Touch, Greece Mandates High Judge As Caretaker PM Ahead ..., Greece warns of going broke as tax proceeds dry up..., Wall Street prepares for Greece exit from Eurozone..., Italy: State Control Collapsing, Bad laws - Failed policies, Spain: Spain Feels the Pain, The New Cultural Reality.
Of course these people are expecting that this will mean that lots of stuff will be soon coming onto the open market instead of being housed in public collections funded from the public purse. Perhaps they are also hoping that as the cuts bite into citizens' disposable income and more and more collectable objects enter the market instead of going to public collections, prices will drop and there will be profits to be made in markets outside the zone directly afected by the crises.
But where is this, when the crisis is even cutting into the employment figures and threatening standards of living even in the US?
The fact that the crisis is even prompting political unrest in the United Kingdpom leads us to consider whether the public purse really can afford the burden of administering the paying out of hundreds of thousands of pounds (perhaps millions, I have never seen a proper estimate of the overall costs) as a result of the Treasure Act in England, Wales and Scotland. Can the state afford to have increasing numbers of people out there ripping these treasures from the security of the archaeological context (in many cases) and then demanding their reward? What is the point of accumulating more and more gold and silver in museums which can barely afford the insurance and costs of the security even now?
To what extent is the current situation sustainable, not only from the point of view of archaeological resource conservation, but also in terms of the sheer costs of the artefact-hoiking free-for-all that exists in the UK at the moment?
Why are US antiquitist doom-and-gloom analysts ignoring the very real costs for the UK of the Portable Antiquities Scheme and Treasure legislation? If in their opinion, other nations are to give up the 'expendable luxury' of protecting their heritage in the way they think fit, why not the British Isles?
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| March in Glasgow City centre |
This has a portable antiquities context too. regular followers of the antiquitist blogosphere will be aware that the austerity measures in European states such as Greece, Spain and Italy have been prompting the leading pro-collecting lobbyists in the US to predict that the end of state custodianship of the archaeological heritage will be coming to an end. For example, one analyst, based on information from MSN and Fox News sees the future of Europe and its cultural heritage in entirely black, if not apocalyptic tones:
Greece: Greek voters deal blow to parties that have govern..., The Collapse of Cultural Property Nationalism, Say your prayers': Attempts to form new Greek gove..., Greeks withdraw $894 million in a day: Is this beg..., Facing Reality, Greek Archaeologists Out of Touch, Greece Mandates High Judge As Caretaker PM Ahead ..., Greece warns of going broke as tax proceeds dry up..., Wall Street prepares for Greece exit from Eurozone..., Italy: State Control Collapsing, Bad laws - Failed policies, Spain: Spain Feels the Pain, The New Cultural Reality.
Of course these people are expecting that this will mean that lots of stuff will be soon coming onto the open market instead of being housed in public collections funded from the public purse. Perhaps they are also hoping that as the cuts bite into citizens' disposable income and more and more collectable objects enter the market instead of going to public collections, prices will drop and there will be profits to be made in markets outside the zone directly afected by the crises.
But where is this, when the crisis is even cutting into the employment figures and threatening standards of living even in the US?
The fact that the crisis is even prompting political unrest in the United Kingdpom leads us to consider whether the public purse really can afford the burden of administering the paying out of hundreds of thousands of pounds (perhaps millions, I have never seen a proper estimate of the overall costs) as a result of the Treasure Act in England, Wales and Scotland. Can the state afford to have increasing numbers of people out there ripping these treasures from the security of the archaeological context (in many cases) and then demanding their reward? What is the point of accumulating more and more gold and silver in museums which can barely afford the insurance and costs of the security even now?
To what extent is the current situation sustainable, not only from the point of view of archaeological resource conservation, but also in terms of the sheer costs of the artefact-hoiking free-for-all that exists in the UK at the moment?
Why are US antiquitist doom-and-gloom analysts ignoring the very real costs for the UK of the Portable Antiquities Scheme and Treasure legislation? If in their opinion, other nations are to give up the 'expendable luxury' of protecting their heritage in the way they think fit, why not the British Isles?
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3 comments:
I would have thought that as an interim measure the cost of the reward system and the cost to museums of acquiring treasure could be addressed by HMRC. If you go out artefact hunting day after day and especially if you flog stuff on EBay, any massive windfalls aren't so much windfalls as "good trading years" and therefore could be deemed taxable.
I know we get these gruesome threats that "unless I get me rights in full I'll flog it on the black market" but it's a bit of a bluff in many cases. Who wants to risk being banged up for five years? In fact, make it ten, it's amazing how compulsion begets responsibility!
Incidentally, as from this summer, the deliberations of the Treasure Valuation Committee were going to be published on line - for the benefit no doubt of the dull witted and ungrateful whose love of 'Istory is so intense they need to be sure they're getting every last penny and not being "ripped off" by the system...
the PAS is a godsend for metaldetectorists.all the free publicity they get for the big finds pushes up the value of their find.even the minor pieces,with the respectability of a PAS number, can add hundreds to the value of a find."sell it on the black market"what a load of rubbish.how much would the finder of the crosby garette helmet get on the black market,a helmet like that with no provenance,10k 15k if his lucky.they need the PAS and if the rewards were even halved,in most cases of the big finds they would still be quids in.as a british tax payer this really pisses me off,especially that some of these detectorists are on benefits and in some cases to ill to work but they are out detecting all day in wet cold fields.
kyri.
".... if the rewards were even halved,in most cases of the big finds they would still be quids in."
I so much agree. It seems that portable antiquities policies are based on several fictions put about by detectorists and (shamefully) not challenged by Archaeology, e.g. lower rewards will boost the black market and regulation will boost nighthawking.
Both are unsupported by either evidence or logic.
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