Summary and Background
3.The Act brings together the principal legislation for the conservation of the historic environment in Wales. It is organised into seven Parts.
4.The main Acts brought together in this consolidation are:
5.The consolidation also restates provisions currently found in other Acts relevant to the historic environment to improve accessibility and clarity. These include:
6.Consolidation has also provided an opportunity to incorporate relevant provisions from secondary legislation into the Act where appropriate. This course has generally been taken when the secondary legislation is well established and is not likely to require frequent amendment.
7.In addition to being supplemented by relevant secondary legislation, the primary legislation is also supplemented by technical planning advice, notably Planning Policy Wales (edition 11, 2021) and Technical Advice Note 24: The Historic Environment (2017) (“TAN 24”). Cadw also publishes a number of non-statutory, best-practice guidance documents relating to the historic environment. Among other things, TAN 24 sets out the selection criteria applied when determining whether to include a monument in the schedule of monuments (Part 2, Chapter 1) and when determining whether a building is of special architectural or historic interest for the purposes of the list of buildings (Part 3, Chapter 1). All of these advice and guidance documents make reference to the Conservation Principles for the Sustainable Management of the Historic Environment in Wales (“Conservation Principles”) published by Cadw, on behalf of the Welsh Ministers, in 2011. Together these documents set out that “conservation” means managing change carefully to protect and preserve what is significant and special about historic assets.