CONTEXT 184 : JUNE 2025 23 LEADERS OF CONSERVATION THOUGHT REBECCA MADGIN Lord Kennet: making government work ‘It can be said that no other single minister before or since has done as much for conservation as Lord Kennet achieved from 1965–1970’ – John Delafons (1997)1 A perhaps unlikely quiz question could be: what connects the signing of the first conservation order on a London pub, the fact that St Pancras is still standing, and the existence of books about Italy, the future of Europe, and nuclear disarmament? The answer would be that they were all achieved by Wayland Young, the 2nd Baron Kennet, also known as Lord Kennet. The praised heaped on Kennet by John Delafons in his magisterial examination of 20th-century conservation policy is therefore just one aspect of Kennet’s long and varied career in public life. Despite this, Lord Kennet is arguably the least well known of the names attached to changes to conservation policy in the 1960s. Perhaps Duncan Sandys and Richard Crossman are the better-known names, but Lord Kennet, in his first government post, left an indelible mark on both how we now conserve and also why we should preserve our historic built environment. The second Lord Kennet, Wayland Young, assumed a role in Harold Wilson’s government in the mid-1960s as a result of a being a hereditary peer. His father, the first Lord Kennet, Sir Hilton Young, was also involved in planning and conservation, introducing the Town and Country Planning Act 1932 as minister of health and housing but this was not, initially, a track that Wayland Young wanted to follow. Instead Wayland pressed for a position within the Foreign Office, a position to which he was well suited given his previous work and writing about Italy. This European connection would however serve him well as he worked within the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (MHLG) most notably, as parliamentary secretary to the Ministry of Housing, and was involved in that pivotal period of British conservation policy which still shapes decision-making today. Wayland’s career inside the MHLG can be characterised as successful and durable. Wayland recalls how he was able to skilfully manoeuvre policies and practices across the period of two government ministers, Richard Crossman and Anthony Greenwood. In so doing Wayland directly informed a number of key areas within the practice of conservation, including the developing of ideas that led to conservation areas, conservation orders, the Four Towns Studies (Bath, Chester, Chichester and York), the Town and Country Planning Act 1968, supporting the maintenance and upgrading of older homes, and chairing the Preservation Policy Group. However, it is in Wayland Young’s work around conservation areas that his greatest legacy lies. John Delafons, principal private secretary to Richard Crossman, believed that ‘It was thanks to him [Wayland Young] that the conservation area concept took hold so quickly and, some would later argue, was applied so indiscriminately’. Indeed Delafons went further to say that this was when the ‘floodgates of conservation were opened’ and that Wayland Young would forever be associated with the ‘presumption in favour of preservation’.² This resulted from Wayland Young’s skilful manoeuvring of policy and practice behind the scenes. Young recounts: ‘I wanted the local authorities to designate many and large areas, which they probably would if they did so without thinking out what had to be done, and then apply increasingly energetic policies in them. If they first discovered how much had to be done 1 John Delafons (1997) Politics and Preservation: a policy history of the built heritage, 1882-1996, Spon, London. ² Delafons (1997) Wayland Kennet (top) worked with fellow government ministers Anthony Greenwood (left) and Richard Crossman (right). (Drawings by Rob Cowan) Duncan Sandys’ private member’s bill became the Civic Amenities Act 1967.
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