In January 2024 it was announced that archaeologists would no longer be able to apply for a CSCS (Construction Skills Certification Scheme) card. These cards offered a certification, commonly requested of construction workers, and until now, most archaeologists were identified either as a ‘Professionally Qualified Person’ or a ‘Academically Qualified Person’ under the scheme.

Here, Research Associate Dr Guillermo Diaz, shares his take on what this might mean for the future of archaeology in construction:

Despite many archaeologists feeling that the card was not particularly relevant to their daily duties, having these cards was clearly beneficial as they certified that archaeologists were aware of the environment of construction sites, making archaeologists’ access onto sites easier. Furthermore, CSCS cards were one of the few certifications that archaeologists and construction staff could have in common, given that their professionalisation paths are remarkably different. Archaeology is one of many newly identified 'non-construction occupations', including geographer, osteologist, and metal detector, indicating a specific range of occupations may have been tackled in this action.

Measuring archaeological expertise is not an easy task, as the knowledge required changes dramatically depending on specialism and career stage. Archaeological teams include experts at fieldwork, surveying, and scientific analysis, including the paleoenvironment and myriad types of archaeological artefacts. They also often include experts in conservation, heritage management, scientific communication, audience engagement, and so on. One thing that archaeologists tend to be very good at is dealing with uncertainty. Despite their best surveying efforts and their regional and local expertise, archaeologists cannot always predict what they might encounter. In this sense, ‘not knowing’ is an intrinsic part of their job, and they tend to be comfortable with that. Construction, on the other hand, is quite averse to tolerating uncertainty, with a great deal of resources and expertise devoted to risk management. The fact that archaeologists handle uncertaintly differently can contribute to archaeology being perceived as a risk. By not having CSCS cards, archaeologists have one less tool to prove their professional competence in the construction environment. While each developer will be free to decide what kind of safety training archaeological teams working on their site need to take, some in the archaeological community fear that this measure will have a negative impact on their relationships with construction, potentially increasing its perception of archaeologists being an unknown quantity, quite literally in terms of adherence to site health and safety, and therefore more of a risk to manage. The medium and longer-term impact of this change on archaeologists and their working relationships has yet to be fully understood.

In general, the integration of archaeology into the planning system has meant that archaeological contractors have adopted values and methods from construction. This, of course, has had some advantages, such as paying more attention to monitoring their own workflow, or developing efficient mechanisms to manage projects. But, at the same time, it doesn’t seem to have increased the agency that archaeologists enjoy to prioritise public benefit during developer-funded projects. Archaeological work, in this sense, should not only be about the production of archaeological knowledge, but also about how to use the knowledge, and the archaeological interventions themselves, to create social value for the communities affected by the project. Furthermore, it seems that the assimilation of construction procedures by archaeology has been limited to certain technical aspects, and has failed to affect (at least in a positive way) the working conditions of archaeologists, whose jobs are more precarious and significantly less remunerated than those of their construction peers with similar skills and experience.  

Removing CSCS cards and potentially replacing them with an occupationally-specific alternative will not reduce or alter the stages a project needs to pass through in the planning system, nor will it reduce statutory protection for archaeology. The question remains whether archaeologists can seize this chance to develop their own certification, one that is accepted by developers but whose contents focus on the actual knowledge that they need to navigate construction sites. The advice from the employers’ body FAME has been to renew CSCS cards to ease access to sites, although they are scoping a replacement. Certifications play a key role in the professionalising practices of a discipline, as they establish what kind of knowledge and skills are to be prioritised and valued. Ultimately this issue has arisen because archaeology is not seen as a construction occupation, so does not fall under the auspices of the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations unless it is part of a larger project. We retain our awkward halfway house status as a result and rely on black hats and precarious statutory protections to justify our presence on site.

What would a potential solution involve? Perhaps we should decide whether we are a critical part of the construction sector, as we were during the COVID pandemic, or whether we are content with being invited guests. Certainly, we need to take control of the current certification chaos. An alternative certificate for archaeologists could even hope to go beyond the technicalities of physically navigating a construction site, to tackle the wider range of risks that archaeologists encounter in their professional life, such as financial hardship or the lack of professional stability.  

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