Renfrew victorious
A neat little coup from thelast week, when its members politely mobbed the coalition's culture spokesman in the Lords, Baroness Rawlings, over the auctioning off to an anonymous buyer of one of the most spectacular UK discoveries of recent years, the Crosby Garrett helmet.
This Roman helmet was sold at Christie's for Β£2.3m - but if it had been made of gold or silver, rather than bronze, it would have been considered treasure - and would have been far more likely to have ended up in a museum, like the Tullie House in Carlisle . At Lords questions, the eminent archaeologist Lord Renfrew raised its fate and asked for a change in the law on treasure (what used to be called treasure trove) so that it covered bronze objects from the Roman era - as well as those made from precious metals.
Lady Rawlings had to admit she had no idea where the helmet now was - although an export licence would be needed, if the owner wanted to take it out of the country. As the questioning widened, she assured Lord Allan of Hallam, the former Lib Dem MP Richard Allan, that funding for the Portable Antiquities Scheme was secure, despite the abolition of its parent body, the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council, in the forthcoming bonfire of the quangos. The (many unearthed by metal-detector users, as was the helmet). APPAG members were ecstatic to get an assurance about its future on the record, and Lord Renfrew was pretty pleased at hints that the law on treasure may be extended to cover bronze artefacts from Roman times.
Another point scored by one of Parliament's most effective interest groups...
I'm Mark D'Arcy and I'll be writing about what goes on in the chambers and committee rooms at Westminster.
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