Heritage Action are reporting that they have been told that
the commercial rally due to be held near a scheduled Roman villa site in Shropshire
was called off, not on conservation grounds but because it could not show it was exempt from complying with health regulations currently in place (and that raises questions about the business status of this organization and its accounting procedures):
That makes two rallies banned recently (Pink Wellies and Sovereign) and one shut down by police halfway through (Let’s Go Digging) but one allowed to go ahead and more than one rally per week scheduled for the rest of the year by Let’s Go Digging (consider the takings, health implications and possible unreported heritage that implies).
Is it too much to hope that the archaeological bodies should get round a table with the police and DCMS and sort this out before next week? (Lest PAS are frit to offend detectorists we suggest they ask around and check the detecting forums for once. All detectorists other than the attendees appear to despise the existence of pay-to-dig rallies, so why the blue blazes are they still allowed to happen?)
We need regulation of the despicable and irresponsible commercialisation of collection-driven exploitation of the achaeological record by metal detectorists, and the time to do that is through emergancy legislation during this pandemic.
"the time to do that is through emergency legislation during this pandemic".
ReplyDeleteExactly. Right now is the perfect time because while everyone knows fewer finds are reported at them and therefore they do damage, it's hard to prove, whereas a dead dog in a cellar can see these jamborees constitute a weekly health hazard to the attendees and their hapless host communities.