Conservation charity the National Trust for Scotland has announced a major overhaul to way it cares for Scotland’s natural, built and cultural heritage as it bids to cut its costs by a 10 per cent.
It is unclear how many jobs will be lost following the announcement that came after a review of the 85-year old charity led by the Board of Trustees, chairman Sir Moir Lockhead and chief executive Simon Skinner.
The charity said it proposes to re-shape itself "around a number of pivotal priorities" over the next three to four years.
These include reducing running costs, focusing accountability and decision-making at property level, new investment in key properties and attracting more visitors to increase income.
The NTS said it plans a "thorough re-configuration" and that this will start at the top with the trust’s leadership and with layers of management being simplified.
Specialist staff across a range of conservation and professional disciplines would be teamed up with regional groupings of heritage sites to provide what would be in effect advisory services to properties.
These experts would be based out in the field, instead of at the trust’s HQ.
Whilst there is an expected reduction in the trust’s total number of staff, staffing levels at properties would be unaffected.
Changes to ways of working and investment in modernised administrative systems and simplified processes would deliver estimated operational savings of circa 10 per cent per annum which could be redirected to conserving heritage properties, improving visitor experiences and priority projects.
The entire programme of change would be self-funding and at the end of three years would lead to a more sustainable model, it is claimed.
The aim would be to bring in an extra £8-10 million per annum of additional investment income for the charity thanks to these efficiency changes, more paying visitors, increased numbers of members and growing donations.
Sir Moir said: "This is an exciting new chapter in our 85-year history, providing new opportunities.
“Hard work has turned around the Trust’s fortunes in the last few years, but we are now ready to move up to the next level to ensure we fulfil our mission of conservation in ways that are more relevant to today’s Scotland."
Since joining the trust in June 2015, Mr Skinner has made it clear that setting and delivering on priorities is key to the trust’s future success.
He said: “We have decided that for the next few years we will concentrate resources on a number of priority properties – each of which will have specific projects and initiatives designed to drive up visitor numbers.
“Our Trustees have judged that upfront investment in these properties would give the greatest returns in terms of increased visitor numbers, income, improved visitor experiences and conservation outcomes as quickly as possible."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here