CAHP advocates to promote and represent matters relating to the business of general heritage practice. Our organizations’ growing constituency of private-sector heritage professionals reflects a wide range of specialized expertise and, as a result, CAHP contributes to the development and improvement of national, provincial and regional heritage matters or policy embracing many disciplines.

To this end, the significance of CAHP’s advocacy is two-fold: it establishes the principles through which the members work AND the number of charters and policies through which our members define principles and practices. In other words, CAHP’s aim for advocacy outlines what it affects and delivers.

CAHP’s earliest advocacy achievements were the Tendering Guidelines and Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics. To assure fair and successful contracts, the Tendering Guidelines are procedures that both clients and consultants can utilize; and, the key principle of the Code of Professional Conduct and Ethics stipulates, “Members must be qualified to perform the work which they accept.” These documents are general, however, can incorporate many disciplines that CAHP and the heritage community represents. Through the past decade, CAHP’s guidelines have received acceptance among the client community and its members.

Through our endeavors, new opportunities evolved as new knowledge and new ways of thinking about heritage issues expanded.  During this time, CAHP members have participated in roundtable discussions, workshops and meetings concerning federal initiatives provincial legislation.  Some topics were RFP procedures, streamlining tasks, and processes to accomplish heritage work.  CAHP’s recent advocacy activities include its participation with the Cultural Human Resources Council, Historic Places Initiative (HPI), Public Works Government Services Canada (PWGSC), and, in Ontario, the Heritage Act, Planners Act and Standards and Guidelines for Consultant Archaeologists (Archaeological Fieldwork).

Much effort and many incidents have built one upon another in ways that have given CAHP its character and, if we can say, its corporate culture.  Members of CAHP have been discovered in a positive way and associated with quality and experienced heritage work.  As a result, some municipalities, such as the City of Toronto, are now making CAHP membership an essential prerequisite for the heritage consultants they engage.  It is through the activities of CAHP members advocating for better business practices and heritage standards that continue to follow-up and collaborate with heritage agencies on behalf of those who work in the Canadian heritage sector.