Looking forward, we have asked our partner organisations and stakeholders to identify the most significant pressures on heritage now, to help inform our future plans.

Heritage is dynamic. Twentieth-century heritage is now beginning to need proper care to safeguard its future. Farming practice and subsidy regimes are changing and so will the needs of our rural heritage. Only ten years ago consulting a rare map or document usually meant travelling to an archive housing it; now thousands of rare books, family history records, paintings and artefacts can be made available in digital form at everyone’s desktop. As society changes, new aspects of heritage become important, producing different demands and opportunities.

Sustainable development is a central theme of 21st-century planning and heritage can make a major contribution to it in its own right. That contribution has not yet been fully explored and evaluated in economic, social and environmental terms. That is a task for the coming years.

Conserving, regenerating and sustaining our heritage
Despite over a decade of lottery investment, much of our prime heritage remains under threat. Major tasks – such as resolving the long-term future of Stonehenge – still cry out to be done. Great buildings, outstanding collections in our museums, libraries and archives, important townscapes and vulnerable landscapes all need long-term care and attention to ensure the full richness of our heritage legacy is available to be enjoyed in future.

Conservation will remain the engine that drives everything that we do to ensure we hand on our most valued heritage to future generations. This does not necessarily imply an ever expanding portfolio of multi-million-pound projects, and we need to be imaginative about getting full value from lottery players’ investment to date. But without continued substantial funding the benefits of many of our achievements will be lost and opportunities to safeguard our future heritage wasted.

Reflecting our diverse heritage
Many people still find that their own history is not visible in our national heritage as it is presented today.

Britain’s story – of Empire, conquest, invasion, migration and cultural openness – is an exceptionally rich one and cannot be properly told unless every strand of the tale is visible. As citizens, as particular communities, and as a nation, our identity is shaped by our heritage and we all have the right to see our story reflected in the grand narrative as well as to tell our own tales.

We will support people from all communities to identify and share their own heritage and to find new meanings in our national story.

Young people
There are few other funding sources that specifically bring together heritage and young people and yet young people tell us that they value highly the skills and experience they derive from involvement in heritage projects.

We will help to deliver more opportunities for young people to learn about who they are and where they have come from, giving them the confidence to know their own heritage and respect that of others.

Volunteering
There is a huge untapped market for new volunteers from all parts of society but more needs to be done to make the connection between people and the heritage that needs their help.

We will increase the number of opportunities for volunteering in heritage, strengthen support through relevant training, and attract new volunteers – particularly young people and people from under-represented groups – to ensure that our heritage is sustained in good condition for the long term.

Learning and skills
Providing opportunities to learn about heritage was an early priority for us and will continue to be at the heart of the projects that we fund. There is also an acute lack of the special skills needed to maintain our heritage and support the economy as a whole.

We want to equip more people with the knowledge and skills to care for the culture, places and knowledge that we have inherited and want to pass on to the future, in a dynamic and progressive heritage sector whose workforce fully reflects the diversity of our society.

QUESTION 1:
In the light of our three strategic aims, do you agree with our plans for the future set out above? Are there things that we should stop funding or to which we should give greater priority?