The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government has granted listed building consent to restoration work on the war memorial in St Peter’s Street, St Albans.

This work will be the first part of a restoration programme for the war memorials in the care of St Albans City and District Council.

The Council is committed to honouring those who died for their country and to the long-term preservation of the City’s war memorial heritage.

Last year Cabinet agreed to obtain specialist advice on the cleaning and maintenance of the war memorial at the top of St Peter’s Street, St Albans.

It also agreed to an inspection of all the City war memorials with a view to putting in place an ongoing programme of cleaning and maintenance.

All the war memorials in the Council’s care have been inspected by a stonework and conservation specialist. He has advised us which war memorials require restoration work and how this should be done

A programme of work has been drawn up for the restoration of five war memorials.

The first stage relates to the restoration of the grade II war memorial in St Peter’s Street. This will involve cleaning, re-pointing work and the restoration of the names of members of the armed forces who died in World War II. The names are located separately at the base of the memorial and are difficult to read due to erosion.

As part of the restoration process, we will meet the request of the family concerned and correct one of the names which was originally misspelt.

Although the Council obtained quotes for this work some time ago, work could not be undertaken without listed building consent.

As the work is likely to take up to twelve weeks to be carried out, we do not plan to start it before Remembrance Sunday on 11 November 2012.

The names of those who died in World War II are inscribed on stone panels. Each panel will be extracted and temporarily taken off site so it can be properly restored. While the work is being undertaken, the memorial will be fenced off.

The restoration will take place at the earliest opportunity next spring, when the weather conditions will be more suitable for the re-pointing work to be carried out.