National Trust

[jno]

What's the difference between the National Trust and English Heritage? They both seem to do the same thing. Do we need them both?

[Fitzer]

English Heritage is what was the old Dept. Of Works and hence is funded by government. The National Trust on the other hand is a charity. As to how they differ in what they do, well that's another matter but one thing is for sure neither is going to give the properties they currently have to the other and close down.

[Octavius]

As mentioned,

The National Trust was founded in 1895 by three Victorian philanthropists.  Concerned about the impact of uncontrolled development and industrialisation, they set up the Trust to act as a guardian for the nation in the acquisition and protection of threatened coastline, countryside and buildings.  They are a registered charity and completely independent of Government, therefore relying heavily on the generosity of subscribing members.

EH is part of the government body and is ruled by government policy.

[LordyGeordie]

as the other two have mentioned -

english heritage while not actually a governemnt body is funded by the government and as well as looking after some historic builings it carries out certain statutory functions. it is often used for consultation for planning applications involving a grade 1 or grade 2* building. it also decides whether a building should be listed or not. another function it helps with is the distibution of national lottery cash through the heritage lottery fund.

the national trust is a private charity and although it may receive government grants it does not fulfill any such stautory roles and its prime role is to look after its buildings.

there has been talk about the two merging although it would not be practical. one of the principal reasons for this is that it is doubtful whether the national trust would want to take on english heritage's buildings.

many of english heritage's buildings are open for free whereas there is a charge for national trust properties. also the national trust tends to favour the large stately homes etc. that draw a big crowd and can almost run at a profit. a lot of EH's buildings tend to be of the crumbing ruin variety which require a lot of maintenance and are not such big crowd-pullers. there are obvious exceptions to that rule but that is how it tends to be in most cases

[jno]

Excellent collection of answers; thanks, everyone, just the sort of things I wanted to know. Three stars all round