By Thom Kennedy

Last updated at 13:20, Tuesday, 30 December 2008

Claims by the Conservatives that Hadrian’s Wall is under threat from lack of funding have been rejected by the organisation which looks after it.

Hadrians wall near the Roman fort at Housteads

Shadow Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt has claimed that several historic landmarks around England – including the wall – are being left to fall into disrepair because of a lack of funds for essential maintenance work.

However, Nigel Mills, director of world heritage for Hadrian’s Wall Heritage Ltd, has denied this is the case.

He said: “There’s always a need for more money, looking after Hadrian’s Wall evidently takes a huge amount of resources as it is such a long monument.

“There are parts of the monument in need of repair, but that is not something that’s suddenly happened.

“It is a long term programme, and there are not parts that are under immediate threat.”

The Tories claimed that as well as the wall, the Frogmore Royal Mausoleum at Windsor where Queen Victoria and Prince Albert are buried, Lord Byron’s ancestral home at Newstead Abbey, and the site of the 1066 Battle of Stamford Bridge in East Yorkshire are under threat.

Mr Hunt also said that for the first time in almost a decade more sites were added to English Heritage’s “at risk” register last year than were removed.

Roman Cumbria is enjoying investment at the moment – Tullie House Museum in Carlisle is to be reinvented as a “Roman Gateway” as part of a £570,000 scheme.

An £11.5m Roman museum has been revealed as the key to a major tourism development planned around the Senhouse Roman Museum in Maryport.

And Vindolanda Roman Fort, in Tynedale, recently received a £4m lottery grant to renovate the site and the Roman Army Museum at Carvoran.

Mr Mills added: “There is evidently a long term programme of repair needed to various sections of the wall, and at the moment there are some significant opportunities coming up through other sources of funding.”

First published at 11:27, Tuesday, 30 December 2008
Published by http://www.newsandstar.co.uk