Fears for N Ireland's heritage

Numbers of thatched cottages have fallen sharply

By Newsnight arts and culture correspondent Madeleine Holt

As politicians debate the future of Northern Ireland, a row is going on about what is happening to its past.

The last few years have seen widespread destruction of old buildings, in the headlong rush towards investment and development.

More than 3,000 rural homes have been demolished in the last three years.

The British conservation group, SAVE Britain's Heritage, calls it a "tide of destruction" - the result of a "lack of political will" to save Northern Ireland's historic environment.

Once they have built their new place... they then have to destroy their old home

Among the casualties are cottages and farmhouses dating from the 17th Century.

They amount to some of the oldest buildings in Northern Ireland - there is almost nothing left from before then, with the exception of Celtic and prehistoric remains.

'Bizarre logic'

Why is this happening? It is all because of a profoundly unsophisticated grants system which gives people far more money to build new homes than to restore old properties.

Once they have built their new place - usually a bungalow - they then have to destroy their old home. That is the bizarre logic of civil servants.

it seems this highly wasteful policy... is likely to continue

And, to cap it all, UK taxpayers are in effect helping fund this scheme through Northern Ireland's Housing Executive.

Conservationists in Northern Ireland can only watch, horrified, as what is left of Northern Ireland's historic landscape is erased.

There is a long history of rural destruction: there were some 30,000 thatched cottages in 1950, now there are only 120.

Taxing problem

The Ulster Architectural Heritage Society is vocal in its criticism of the grants scheme.

It argues that people who want to restore their homes should get the same grant as those who want to start from scratch.

The big problem is VAT - you cannot claim it on the costs of restoration.

Until that changes, it seems this highly wasteful policy of knocking down at times repairable homes is likely to continue.

Listed buildings are allowed to become so dilapidated they are then demolished

Meanwhile, the body entrusted with looking after Northern Ireland's heritage, the Environment and Heritage service, has been recommending far more buildings should be delisted - in effect allowing them to be demolished - than should be protected.

This compares with English Heritage's record of listing some 50 times more buildings than it puts forward for delisting.

Already, some buildings are being knocked down, once they have lost their special protection.

What was a fine Victorian hotel on the seafront in Bangor, is now a one-story shell, due to become luxury flats.

One of Northern Ireland's few workhouses - which cared for victims of the potato famine - is due to be delisted too.

'Under pressure'

Meanwhile, enforcement powers are so rarely used, listed buildings are allowed to become so dilapidated they are then demolished.

The accusation is that the civil servants recommending delisting are feeling the pressure from developers.

There needs to be a fundamental shift in priorities

They dispute that. But in many instances they have suggested buildings lose their protection from demolition because people have made relatively minor alterations.

SAVE Britain's Heritage says the reasons for delisting are often "farcical".

Why not force homeowners to reverse those alterations, it argues, rather than using them as an excuse to take a building off the protected list?

The Environment and Heritage service told the BBC's Newsnight programme that the trend towards delisting would now come to an end.

But it will take more than that to save what is left of Northern Ireland's heritage.

There needs to be a fundamental shift in priorities - a new awareness that Northern Ireland needs the old as much as the new.

Who, in the end, wants to visit a landscape smothered by bungalows and get-rich-quick developments?