A Day in the Life of Andrew Robertson, Lead for Aim 3: Caring and Protecting
Andrew Robertson is the Archaeology/ Heritage Officer for East Lothian and Midlothian councils. He is also currently the Chair of the Association for Local Government Archaeological Officers: Scotland (ALGAO:Scotland) and is joint Aim lead for Aim 3 – Care and Protect, of Scotland’s Strategic Archaeology Strategy.
My background is as a commercial field archaeologist, and I worked all over the UK on numerous projects for well over a decade. My current role, which I have been in since 2008, is as a Local Authority Archaeologist, essentially what used to be called County Archaeologist, and I am responsible for the counties of East Lothian and Midlothian. This means that no two days are similar as virtually anything ‘old’ comes across my desk, from prehistoric burials through to 1970’s phone boxes!
My main role is to advise the council’s planning department upon any potential impacts upon the historic environment which may arise from planning applications or development proposals. This essentially involves assessing all proposals and applications which are submitted to the council. As an idea of the scale of this for 2021/22 23,000 applications were assessed across Scotland of which 10% ultimately lead to archaeological mitigation.
To enable this to be done each authority maintains and updates its own Historic Environment Record (HER) many of which are online and can be accessed by everybody. Luckily for me I have a colleague, Stephanie Leith, who does all the technical wizardry, as I would still be using index cards! These contain information of all the known historic environment assets for both counties (over 20,000) and are essential in ensuring that the historic environment is managed and cared for sustainably.
By using the HER, Historic Maps, LiDAR data, as well as a good knowledge of my area, I can quickly call up information and past decisions made on everything from large estates through to individual fence post holes. This allows me to advise on what mitigation is needed for archaeological sites, potential sites, historic buildings, historic landscapes and coast lines etc (this is why we tend to use the term historic environment as my role encompasses more than the traditional ‘holes in the ground’ archaeology). Mitigation can range from avoidance and redesign of proposals through to full archaeological excavation. This advice is the basis for much of the archaeological work that happens in Scotland (over 95% of all archaeological work, including building recording) and is a direct result of the work of Local Authority Archaeologists.
In addition to advising planning a large part of my role is also to help manage the councils own historic assets. One of the more recent projects I have been involved in was the redevelopment of Preston Tower in Prestonpans. This is a 15th Century tower house which sits in public gardens in the heart of Prestonpans. Access had not been possible for the community for a long time due to safety concerns. Working with other council officers, the National Trust, the community and conservation architects the tower, and attendant doocot, were consolidated and access was enabled by reintroducing the external staircase. Interpretation, including a film projection for how the interiors would have evolved, was also developed and delivered. The tower is now accessible, and the redevelopment has won several conservation architecture awards.
The final main role I have is outreach in relation to the historic environment. This ranges from organising East Lothian Local History fortnight, organising our Annual Edinburgh Lothians and Borders Archaeology conference, through helping local groups with their projects to helping members of the public identify things they have uncovered.
There are many other aspects of my role such as advocacy with politicians, advising on local and national policies/ strategies, negotiation with landowners, dealing with the impacts of coastal erosion, dealing with unexpected human remains, working with the police, working with universities, schools and youth groups, really the list is endless but I have a strict word limit!
I hope this has given you a bit of a flavour of what a ‘day in the life’ is for myself and any of the other Local Authority Archaeologists. Basically, there is no such thing as a regular day for me and I often comment that I rarely know what I will be doing on any given day (each e-mail or phone call can totally rearrange my diary!). That is one of the joys and frustrations of being a Local Authority Archaeologist.