§ Mr. Greg Knightasked the Secretary of State for the Environment whether any of the seven sites nominated by 686W the Government for inclusion on the world heritage list have been accepted; and whether any further nominations are to be submitted to the World Heritage Committee.
§ Mr. WaldegraveI am delighted to say that the World Heritage Committee at its meeting in Paris last week decided that all seven of the sites nominated by the Government last year will be placed on the world heritage list from 1 January 1987. The sites are:
- Durham Cathedral and Castle, Durham
- Studley Royal and Fountains Abbey, North Yorkshire
- The Castles and town walls of King Edward I in Gwynedd
- Ironbridge Gorge, Shropshire
- Stonehenge and Avebury, Wiltshire
- St. Kilda, Scotland
- Giant's Causeway, Northern Ireland
I am delighted by this decision, which gives proper recognition to the extraordinarily rich and diverse inheritance we have in the United Kingdom, covering 3,000 years and more.
Under the world heritage convention, each participating state is entitled to nominate sites annually and we shall be putting forward a further nine sites for consideration by the World Heritage Committee in 1987 for inclusion in the 1988 list. These sites are:
- St. David's Close and Bishop's Palace, Dyfed
- Blenheim Palace, Oxon
- The Palace of Westminster, London
- Ecclesiastical Sites of Lough Erne, Northern Ireland
- Bath, Avon
- New Lanark, Strathclyde
- Hadrian's Wall
- The Lake District
- St. Helena: Diana's Peak and High Peak, South Atlantic Ocean
I look forward to these sites being given similar recognition by the World Heritage Committee during next year and added to the list in 1988.