Heritage competence and conservation accreditation

Nobody is licensed to write a heritage statement. There is no statutory register, no protected title and no legal bar on an architect, an agent or an owner preparing one. What exists instead is a competence expectation: national policy requires the applicant to describe the significance of any heritage asset affected, in enough detail to understand the impact, and councils reject statements that plainly were not written by somebody who could do that. So the practical question of who can write a heritage statement resolves into whether the author can assess significance rather than describe a building.

On a grade II shopfront alteration, a capable design team member can usually do it. On a grade I church, a scheduled monument or a scheme involving substantial harm, they cannot, and the refusal will say so.

What a significance assessment requires of the author

Significance is not a list of features. It is an assessment of why an asset matters, expressed through the heritage values that Historic England set out in its conservation principles: evidential, historical, aesthetic and communal.

Doing that properly means archival research, an understanding of construction history and materials, the ability to read a building's phasing from its fabric, and enough comparative knowledge to say whether a detail is common or rare for its type and date. It also means assessing setting, which is a separate exercise with its own published methodology and which is where most weak statements fall over.

Then comes the harm judgement. The author has to say whether the proposal causes no harm, less than substantial harm or substantial harm, place it within that range, and set out the public benefits that might outweigh it. Those are legal tests flowing from sections 16, 66 and 72 of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 and from national policy, and getting the category wrong invalidates the whole balance.

Accreditation routes and what each signals

Several accreditation schemes exist, and they signal different things.

• The Institute of Historic Building Conservation admits full members on assessed competence in conservation practice, and its membership is common among local authority conservation officers.
• The RIBA Conservation Register recognises architects at graded levels, with the specialist conservation architect grade sitting at the top.
• Architects Accredited in Building Conservation runs a separate assessed register for architects working on historic fabric.
• RICS operates a building conservation accreditation for surveyors.
• The Chartered Institute for Archaeologists accredits archaeologists, which matters where below-ground or standing fabric recording is involved.
• Conservation accreditation for engineers exists through the engineering institutions for structural work to historic buildings.

None of these is a statutory requirement for authorship of a planning document. What they do is answer the question a case officer forms silently on page two, which is whether the person writing this has been assessed by their peers on exactly this kind of work.

Some councils go further and state in their local validation list that heritage statements for higher graded assets must be prepared by an accredited or suitably qualified person. Check the list before you commit to writing it in-house, because a council can reject a report because of its author where its published requirements say so.

Where a design team member can write it

For a large volume of ordinary work, a competent architect or planner writing carefully will produce something perfectly acceptable. Replacement windows in an unlisted building in a conservation area. A rear extension to a grade II house where the affected fabric is a twentieth century addition. A shop front in a terrace of similar frontages.

The conditions for that are honest ones. The asset is grade II or unlisted. The affected fabric is not the significant part. The harm, if any, is at the low end. The evidence base is available without archival work, meaning the list entry, historic maps, the conservation area appraisal and a careful site visit will cover it.

Write it to the published structure, be specific about what is being lost, and do not overclaim. A Heritage Statement that says a proposal causes a low level of less than substantial harm, and explains precisely why, reads better than one insisting there is no harm at all when a chimney is coming down.

When a specialist is unavoidable

Bring in an accredited specialist where any of the following applies: the asset is grade I or grade II*, the proposal involves a scheduled monument, the works affect primary historic fabric or original plan form, demolition of a listed building or a substantial part of one is proposed, the harm might be substantial, or the scheme relies on an optimum viable use argument.

Also bring one in where the setting of a designated asset is the issue and the effect is contested. Setting cases turn on analysis of views, experience and the contribution the setting makes to significance, and they are routinely tested at appeal.

Archaeology runs on a separate track. Where a site sits in an archaeological priority area or the county archaeologist has flagged potential, an Archaeological Desk-Based Assessment from a practice with the relevant accreditation is what the curator will expect, and a heritage statement does not substitute for it. Where fabric is to be lost, historic building recording to a defined level is usually conditioned.

Structuring the statement to the published advice

Historic England's advice note on statements of heritage significance gives a structure that officers recognise, and following it removes an entire category of argument. In outline it runs: identify the assets affected, understand their significance through the heritage values, describe the proposal, assess the effect on significance, then explain how harm has been avoided, minimised or mitigated.

The order matters. A statement that describes the proposal before establishing significance reads as a justification exercise, and conservation officers say so in their consultation responses.

Proportionality is written into the requirement. A small alteration to an unlisted building in a conservation area does not need forty pages. What it needs is the right assets identified, the significance stated with evidence, and the effect assessed honestly.

Common weaknesses officers identify

The recurring failures are consistent across authorities:

1. Description in place of assessment, so the reader learns the date and the materials but never why the building matters.
2. Setting ignored, or dealt with by asserting that the proposal is not visible from the asset without any view analysis.
3. The harm category left unstated, which leaves the officer to pick one, usually less favourably than you would have.
4. No consideration of alternatives, where the policy test expects avoidance and minimisation to be shown.
5. Public benefits asserted without evidence, particularly optimum viable use claims unsupported by figures.
6. Photographs of the exterior only, with no record of the interior fabric being altered.

Peer review catches most of these before submission. What a reviewer takes on when they sign off is worth understanding before you ask for it, because a review is a professional judgement with liability attached, not a formality.

Listed building consent drawings and who prepares them

Consent applications are refused on drawings more often than on prose. The expectation is existing and proposed drawings at a scale that shows what is happening to the fabric, typically 1:50 for plans and elevations and 1:20 or 1:10 for junctions, mouldings, glazing bars and new openings, plus a written schedule of works room by room keyed to the drawings.

Measured survey underpins all of it. A proposal drawn over an inaccurate base will be found out during the site visit.

An AI-assisted draft can structure the narrative, gather the policy and guidance references and flag every place a site-specific fact is still missing. It cannot visit the building, read the phasing in the brickwork or form the significance judgement, and it should not be presented as though it has. Professional review is strongly advised for any heritage document, and the professional directory is the route to a reviewer who can sign one off.

This is general guidance, not legal advice; check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it.

PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.