House of Commons - Culture, Media and Sport

Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport First Report

NATIONAL MUSEUMS AND GALLERIES

12. The museums and galleries in the UK constitute a treasure trove of artistic, cultural, historical and scientific artefacts and expertise. For example the British Museum saw itself as holding in trust for the nation and the world one of the finest collections of art and antiquities in existence, spanning two million years of human history and every continent.[7] The Director, Mr Neil MacGregor, denied that the collection was a hotch-potch of knick-knacks and said that the British Museum was a unique 'World Service' amongst museums and amongst cultures.[8] In similar vein the Natural History Museum laid claim to a secure place in the top three natural history museums in the world with a collection of 70 million items including over 800,000 accepted reference specimens for given species.[9] The British Museum and the Natural History Museum between them welcomed over seven million people in 2001-02.

13. Despite the, to some, off-putting term 'museum', the UK's museums and galleries together represent a living resource that significantly enriches many people's experience and has the potential to do so for many more. As Re:source (the Council for Museums, Libraries and Archives) put it, museums can "change people's lives, contributing to their enjoyment, inspiration, learning potential, and cultural values, as well as to community cohesion, economic prosperity and social equity. This potential lies within all museums—regional as well as national institutions."[10] We whole-heartedly agree with this statement.

14. Museums and galleries also make substantial contributions to the welfare of the country as a whole. The role of the museums and galleries in formal education from primary school visits through to post-graduate studies for scholars from all round the world was referred to throughout our evidence.[11] In addition the contribution to less formal lifelong learning from visits made primarily for entertainment should not be under-estimated. With regard to tourism the English Tourism Council described the Government-sponsored museums and galleries as "a magnet to visitors and scholars alike" and of "significant importance to the tourism industry".[12] We were surprised that the museums had not undertaken research on this point—if only to demonstrate to HM Treasury the tangible contribution made by them to the UK economy in terms of the tourism balance of trade.[13]

15. We have already referred to the role of the museums in maintaining the UK's high status in the world of science and many other disciplines. We visited the Natural History Museum in October and, amongst other things, saw how the collection could be used for purposes never imagined by the original collectors. For instance, the Museum's collection of non-biting midges, built up over the last 150 years, was now being used to develop a way of tracking changes in climate going back to the last ice age to inform the current debate (see Annex II). Perhaps most importantly these institutions are also fun and fascinating places to visit.

16. There are nearly 2000 registered museums and galleries in the UK with about 1500 of these in England. They come in all shapes and sizes covering a wide range of interests and are owned and funded in a variety of ways (though usually with charitable status): those governed by independent trusteeships, local authorities and universities form the majority. A small, but very important, minority of these institutions are directly funded by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport as national museums and galleries. It is these sponsored museums and galleries which have been the focus of action by the Government on their admission policies and thus are the main focus of this Report although we also refer below to the Government's plans for the regional museums in so far as they are known.

The sponsored museums and galleries

17. The museums and galleries sponsored by the Department comprise: the British Museum; the National Gallery and National Portrait Gallery, the Tate group; Sir John Soane's Museum; the Wallace Collection; the Geffrye Museum, the Horniman Museum, the National Museum of Science and Industry group, the Victoria and Albert group; the Imperial War Museum group, the National Maritime Museum, the Natural History Museum, the Royal Armouries group, the Museum of London, the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester, the National Museums and Galleries on Merseyside, the Tyne & Wear Museums, the National Coal Mining Museum for England, and the Wellington Museum.

18. Seventeen of these institutions are non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs) and exempt charities governed by independent boards of trustees appointed by the Prime Minister or Secretary of State. The DCMS is not involved in the day to day running of any of these museums and galleries (although some micro-management was indicated[14]) but is accountable to Parliament for the public funding provided to them. The museums and galleries are accountable to Parliament, through Ministers, for their spending and the proper management of their institutions including the safeguarding of the national collections.[15]

19. The trustees have specific statutory duties which may vary in detail but to a large extent hinge around the twin responsibilities of caring for the collections and providing for public access to them. These factors were emphasised in evidence to us by a number of museums, notably the Natural History Museum and the Imperial War Museum.[16] Decisions on policies such as admissions charging are formally and ultimately a matter for each board of trustees to determine in the light of their interpretation of their statutory responsibilities.

MOVEMENT TOWARDS FREE ADMISSION TO THE SPONSORED INSTITUTIONS

20. The Department told us that the Government was committed to free admission to the core collections of the national museums and galleries "from the outset" in 1997.[17] The result was a phased programme, in the words of the DCMS "according to priority groups and the availability of funds".[18] In April 1999 admission charges for children were dropped and there was a resulting 32 per cent rise in children's visits by March 2002. In April 2000 free admission for people over 60 was introduced and there was a 40 per cent rise in visits by the over-60s over the same period. On 1 December 2001 free admission for all was introduced and the compensation for these changes provided by the Department totalled

£26.02 million up until March 2002.[19]

21. The DCMS memorandum described the move to free admission for all as "much more difficult to achieve" due to the VAT regime.[20] A sponsored museum or gallery that ceased to charge for admission would no longer be regarded as a business and would therefore lose the ability to recover its input VAT. This barrier was overcome as announced in the 2001 Budget with a change in the VAT regime from April of that year.[21] This was an important achievement much to the credit of the then Secretary of State, the Rt Hon Chris Smith MP.

EXTENDING THE VAT PROVISION

22. Free local authority museums have been able to recover their VAT for a number of years as a result of provisions within Section 33 of the VAT Act 1994. As the Museums Association pointed out, this leaves the university museums, with their long tradition of free access, as the only group of publicly funded museums still burdened with a perverse incentive to charge. The Association said that the provisions made for the national museums could be extended to the university museums without any need for primary legislation and that the estimated cost to the Treasury would be about £500,000 a year. This the Association describes as "affordable for the Exchequer" but of "significant benefit to the museums concerned."[22] The Minister for the Arts, Baroness Blackstone, told us that the Department had made it clear that the VAT provision was "ring-fenced" for the national collections and that, while she recognised the case for extension, the Treasury would argue that the issues raised would be "very difficult to deal with in relation to EU rules".[23] We need a much clearer explanation if this Committee is to be convinced.

23. We perceive that the principle of allowing the recovery of VAT by free museums has now been established on two occasions. Anyone familiar with the pursuit of reduced rates of VAT for energy efficiency materials will also be familiar with the impenetrable shield provided by "EU rules" for some years and the amazing speed with which this barrier evaporated once the case was actually pressed home with the Commission.[24] We welcome the eminently sensible adjustment to the Value-Added Tax regime which allows non-charging museums and galleries to reclaim their input VAT despite not operating formally as businesses. We note that free local authority museums have been in this happy position since 1994 and we urge the Government to take a final logical step in extending this provision to free university museums. On the figures put forward by the Museums Association, this step should not prove unduly onerous to the Exchequer.

TAKING THE FINAL STEP

24. As stated above on 1 December 2001 the vast majority of sponsored museums and galleries became free to all with respect to their core collections.

National Museums and Galleries
Always Free The British Museum The National Gallery The National Portrait Gallery Tate Modern Tate Britain Tate Liverpool Sir John Soane's Museum The Wallace Collection The Geffrye Museum The Horniman Museum The National Museum of Photography, Film and Television in Bradford (part of NMSI) The Bethnal Green National Museum of Childhood (part of the V&A) The Tyne and Wear Museums Free from November 2001 The Victoria and Albert (V&A) The National Museum of the Performing Arts (part of the V&A)	Free from 1 December 2001 The Imperial War Museum The National Maritime Museum The Natural History Museum The National Museum of Science and Industry group (NMSI) The Royal Armouries in Leeds and at Fort Nelson, Portsmouth The Museum of London The Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester The National Museums and Galleries in Merseyside Free in 2002 The National Coal Mining Museum for England (from April) The Imperial War Museum of the North, Trafford (opened to the public on 5 July)
Those which continue to charge for adults The Imperial War Museum's Cabinet War Rooms, HMS Belfast and Duxford airfield; Tate St Ives; Wellington Museum, Apsley House; Royal Armouries at the Tower of London (included within the Tower of London entry fee charged by Historic Royal Palaces)