APPENDIX 16
Memorandum submitted by the National Football
Museum
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The National Football Museum is a major new
museum of national and international significance.
It holds the world's finest football collection,
consisting of over 25,000 items, including the FIFA Museum Collection,
and the collections of the FA, the Football League and Wembley
Stadium.
The Museum has attained National Registration
Status with Resource, the Government body for promoting standards
in museums. Only 19 museums in England have achieved this.
The National Football Museum is the only one
of these 19 registered national museums currently operating without
either national or local public revenue funding.
The Museum has been nominated for European Museum
of the Year 2003, and has been very positively received by the
public and the media.
The Museum is an independent charitable trust,
and is currently dependent on admissions charges and other earned
income to meet its revenue costs.
The Museum was a £15 million capital project,
primarily made possible by a grant of £9.3 million from the
Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF).
It is the only major new museum created by HLF
funding, which is not an out-station of an existing national museum
or museum service.
Revenue funding of £400,000 per annum is
required to meet the Government's commitment that national museums
would have free access to all.
The National Football Museum is strongly positioned
to fulfil both the cultural and sporting objectives of DCMS.
It represents excellent value for money in comparison
with the national and non-national museums funded by DCMS.
DCMS has set a precedent for funding a new national
museum, in the support given from 2001-02 onwards to the National
Coal Mining Museum of England.
This paper is structured as follows:
1. Background: the development and significance
of the Museum
2. The Revenue Funding Need: why the Museum
needs additional funding support
3. Sources of Funding: the potential sources
of funding to meet this need
4. The Case for DCMS support: on what grounds
should DCMS support the Museum?
1. BACKGROUND
1.1 The National Museum of the National Game
Football is the "the people's game",
a key part of England's heritage and way of life. England is also
the home of football, the birthplace of the world's most popular
sport. Over the past century football has spread from England
to over 200 countries worldwide: there are more member countries
in FIFA, football's world governing body, than in the United Nations.
The "national game" clearly needed
a national museum to reflect this unique contribution that England
has made to international sport and culture. It is surprising,
therefore, that it took until 2001 to establish the National Football
Museum. Sir Stanley Rous, as Secretary of the Football Association,
first considered the possibility of establishing such a museum
in 1953. A number of attempts were made, until the announcement
of a grant award by the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) in November
1997 to the project based in Preston, Lancashire, finally made
the creation of the National Football Museum possible. As the
"home" of football, it was entirely appropriate that
FIFA should choose the English National Football Museum as the
permanent home for the FIFA Museum Collection.
HLF recognised the special importance of football's
heritage in making the grant award to establish the Museum. HLF's
general policy was (and remains today) that there were already
sufficient museums in existence, which therefore should have the
priority for support. However, football was too significant a
part of England's heritage not to be represented in a national
museum, and none of the existing national museums could appropriately
establish a national football museum as a new out-station (as,
for example, the Science Museum had done in setting up the National
Railway Museum in York and the National Museum of Photography,
Film and Television in Bradford). HLF therefore decided it was
appropriate to fund an entirely new and independently established
national museum for football. The National Football Museum remains
the only major new museum funded by HLF, that is not a branch
of a pre-existing national (or indeed, local) museum service.
The Museum opened to the public in February
2001, and was officially opened by the Duke of Kent on 21 June
2001.
1.2 The Museums' Mission Statement
Why does the Museum exist?
The National Football Museum exists to explain
how and why football has become "the people's game",
a key part of England's heritage and way of life. It also aims
to explain why England is the home of football, the birthplace
of the world's most popular sport.
Who is the Museum for?
The Museum is for everyone, football fans and
non-fans alike. People without a keen interest in football will
enjoy finding out why so many people are so passionate about the
game.
How does the Museum achieve its goals?
The Museum seeks to achieve this by undertaking
the following seven key aims:
— Developing the finest and most significant
collection of objects and associated evidence connected with the
development of football around the world.
— Protecting this important part of
our cultural heritage for the benefit of all, both now and in
the future.
— Researching the collection to explain
how and why football has become the most popular sport in the
world.
— Interpreting the collection in an
entertaining and informative way, primarily through exhibitions,
events and publications.
— Providing a range of educational
opportunities based on the collection, for learners of all ages
and levels of attainment.
— Satisfying customers with a level
of visitor care which exceeds their expectations.
— Managing our resources effectively
and creatively, to constantly innovate and improve the services
we offer.
1.3 Capital Funding
The Museum was a £15 million project, primarily
made possible by a grant of £9.3 million grant from the Heritage
Lottery Fund. Other sources included over £300,000 from the
North West Development Agency, £200,000 from the Football
Foundation and £100,000 from the Professional Footballers
Association (PFA).
1.4 The World's Finest Football Collection
The National Football Museum holds not just
the finest football collection in England, consisting of over
25,000 items, but the finest collection in the world. The 10 individual
major collections which make up the collection of the Museum as
a whole include the FIFA Museum Collection, the FIFA World Cup
Collection, The FIFA Book Collection, the collections of the FA,
the Football League and Wembley Stadium, and items from over 500
individual donors. The collections tell as much about the international
development of the game, as they do about the history of football
within England. The international significance of the collections
was demonstrated by the loan of over 100 items to the centenary
exhibition of the German FA in 2000. During the 2002 World Cup,
the Museum produced an exhibition in partnership with Awaji, the
host city for the England team in Japan. The exhibition received
over 100,000 visitors. Discussions are under way for a similar
exhibition in China for the Women's World Cup in 2003. We have
also loaned items for display to the British Library and the Imperial
War Museum, as well as many local museums across the UK. The international
significance of the collections means that the proposed development
of a "virtual museum" on the web is a tremendous opportunity
to make the collections accessible to football fans and others
around the world.
1.5 National Registration Status
The Museum has attained National Registration
Status with Resource, the Government body for promoting standards
in museums. Only 19 museums in England have achieved this. The
National Football Museum is the only one of these 19 registered
national museums currently operating without either national or
local public revenue funding.
1.6 International Significance of the Museum
There are national football museums in Scotland
and Norway, and museums are planned in Germany, Wales and Brazil.
However, The National Football Museum of England is, and will
always remain, the world's most significant national football
museum. This unique status is because England is the acknowledged
"home" of football, where the modern game was developed.
This was recognised by FIFA, in choosing the English National
Football Museum as the permanent home for the FIFA Museum Collection.
In the words of FIFA, England was the "cradle of the modern
game".
The Museum has been nominated for European Museum
of the Year 2003.
1.7 Why Preston?
There could be no more appropriate location
for the Museum than Deepdale Stadium, the home of Preston North
End FC, which is the oldest football league ground in the world.
Preston has been playing at the same ground since 1878, longer
than any other football league club. Preston North End was the
first winner of the world's oldest football league in 1888-89.
The Football League was based in Preston from 1902 to 1959, and
then in nearby Lytham until 2000, when it returned to Preston.
The Museum's entrance building leads to display
areas within two of the stands at the stadium, the Sir Tom Finney
Stand and the Bill Shankly Kop. The Museum is run entirely independently
from the football club.
1.8 Charitable Status
The Museum is a registered charity, governed
by a board of independent trustees. At present the trustees are:
Brian Booth—Chairman of Trustees; Chairman
of Preston and Chorley Acute Hospitals NHS Trust.
David Fleming—Director, National Museums
and Galleries on Merseyside.
Bryan Gray—Chairman of the North West
Development Agency.
Chris Newbery—Director, Royal Marines
Museum, Portsmouth.
Les Dawson—Managing Director, United Utilities.
Cathy Long—Research and Information Executive,
FA Premier League.
Michael Burns—Professional Footballers
Association.
1.9 Comments by Visitors
Comments have been very positive, as the following
demonstrate:
"It was wonderful, we enjoyed it so much
that it has come into our conversation several times each day
since. It summed up the world of football for us both: expectation,
excitement, poignancy, elation, and glory."
"Echoing down the corridors of time, the
clattering studs, the roar of the crowd, I swear I could smell
the wintergreen. Wonderful!"
"Everyone should come to this outstanding
football experience."
"Excellent, even if football is not your
main interest."
"Stupendous—some items were so poignant
I nearly wept."
"A national treasure. Should be an inspiration
to young footballers of today".
Visitors have come from over 20 countries, a
recognition that England is the birthplace of football. As a Ukrainian
visitor wrote, "Thank you for the beautiful game".
1.10 Media Coverage
The Museum has secured extensive media coverage
both nationally and internationally, including over 50 television
features since the official opening in June 2001. This has included,
for example, a 30-minute programme seen by 240 million viewers
in China. Press quotes have included:
"It is a fantastic place. Yes, fantastic."
The Times
"I spent five hours, dazed by all the wonders,
and can't wait to go again. It's brilliant". Hunter Davies,
The Mail on Sunday
". . . the marvellous National Football
Museum . . . On one level, this is simply an unparalleled collection
of football memorabilia. . . But you really don't have to know
anything about football to enjoy the museum, since `the true story
of the world's greatest game' is backed by fascinating print,
film and sound material on football's origins, its social importance,
the experience of fans through the ages, and other relevant themes.
Plus there are some great interactive exhibits". The Rough
Guide to England, 2002
"The place is truly captivating . . . should
become a place of pilgrimage for anyone with even the remotest
interest in football . . . It is though you'd died and woken up
in football heaven" The Daily Telegraph
"The most extraordinary collection of memorabilia
I have ever seen . . . Even those who profess to hate the sport
will be captivated" Independent on Sunday
"If you think museums are musty, dusty old
places, forget it. This one is a sheer delight, for fans of every
age and persuasion . . . A football shrine to gladden the heart"
Sunday Express
"Sumptuously designed pictorial evidence
. . . The public will be hammering on the doors" The Independent
Since opening international press coverage has
included FIFA Magazine, and coverage in the following countries:
France, Holland, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Italy,
Spain, Portugal, Brazil, Argentina, Japan, New Zealand, Sweden,
Russia, Australia, Mexico, Switzerland, Norway, Croatia and Belgium.
International television coverage to date has
included features in Japan (Fuji, NHK, TBS); Korea (KBS); China;
France; Italy; Greece; Norway; Australia; and mainland Europe
(FIFA TV on Sky Sports, and Sky Sports Features).
1.11 Education and Social Inclusion
The Museum has developed a number of groundbreaking
initiatives in the field of social inclusion. These have included
a project, funded by the New Opportunities Fund, to digitise the
collections and develop a web site, working in partnership with
a charity for vulnerable young people in housing need.
The Institute of Football Studies (IFS) is a
partnership between the National Football Museum and the University
of Central Lancashire. It aims to promote the understanding of
the impact of football on society and to advance knowledge of
all aspects of football through excellence in teaching, research
and scholarship. A number of major research projects have been
undertaken, including a study of the impact of football on the
lives of deaf people, which was funded by The Football Association.
1.12 The National Football Museum "Hall
of Fame"
The concept of a sporting Hall of Fame is well
established, particularly in the USA, where induction is seen
as the ultimate recognition of the contribution and performance
of sporting greats over their careers. And yet, until now, there
has not been a Hall of Fame to celebrate the heroes of the world's
greatest game—football.
As the natural next stage in our development,
we are launching The National Football Museum Hall of Fame, to
recognise and celebrate the achievements of the players and managers
who have made the greatest contributions to the history of the
game in this country. Eligibility will be based on outstanding
sporting excellence and achievement and will cover great names
like Matthews, Finney, Charlton, Moore, Best, Shankly, Dalglish—and
the list goes on.
Selection for entry to the Hall of Fame will
be based on the views of those who know best—a panel of
experts drawn from the ranks of players and managers of the past
and present. We are delighted that amongst other distinguished
names, Sir Bobby Charlton, Sir Tom Finney, Sir Bobby Robson and
Sir Alex Ferguson have agreed to be members of the panel. Needless
to say, membership of the panel will not preclude an individual
from being inducted into the Hall of Fame.
To launch the Hall of Fame we will be holding
an induction reception and dinner at the Museum on 1 December
2002. At this event, the first 29 inductees—22 male players,
one female player and six managers—will be honoured. The
dinner will be attended by the inductees, our selection panel
and by supporters of the Museum from the worlds of football, politics,
entertainment and business.
2. THE MUSEUM'S
REVENUE FUNDING
NEEDS
None of the national museums (or indeed, any
museums in the country) operate without substantial revenue funding,
primarily from public sources. No museum can operate on admissions
income alone. 14 of the national museums receive substantial funding
from DCMS; two from the Ministry of Defence; two from local sources;
leaving only The National Football Museum without public revenue
support.
To fulfill its mission in the long term, The
National Football Museum will require public revenue funding.
This has become a problem in the short term, given that to date
the Museum has not met its initial visitor admissions target.
A target of 80,000 visitors per annum was set, but the Museum
attracted 40,000 visitors in its first year. There are a number
of reasons for this shortfall in visitor numbers to date:
— The lack of an adequate marketing
budget—no funding was provided by the HLF or other stakeholders
to launch the Museum.
— The success of government policy
in extending free admission to all at the national (and non-national)
museums funded by DCMS, which has drawn substantially more visitors
to the museums in Liverpool and Manchester.
— The particular difficulties in launching
a new museum in 2001, ie the foot-and-mouth issue and the events
of 11 September, both of which had a major impact on tourism.
— The free admission at the national
museums has highlighted the fact that the admission charges at
the National Football Museum have inevitably discouraged some
visitors. We have done all we can to offer a full range of concessions
to less affluent members of society. Any further reductions in
the admissions price would mean that the Museum would have to
attract substantially more visitors.
— The location of the Museum. The Museum
is in Preston for heritage reasons, as discussed in 1.7 above,
but it is the first major visitor attraction in England's newest
city. New national museums in London have had the advantage of
an existing tourism infrastructure. This was also the case with
the National Railway Museum in York, which opened in 1975. The
National Museum of Photography, Film and Television in Bradford,
opened in 1983, has demonstrated that a new national museum can
succeed in a town or city which previously attracted few tourists
or day-trippers. However, it had the advantage of free admission
at the time of opening.
Ideally, as the national museum of the national
game, the National Football Museum should be free to all. Indeed,
as the museum of the people's game, the game traditionally of
the less affluent in society, the working class, there is a strong
argument that free entry is needed even more at The National Football
Museum than at the other national museums, particularly those
in London.
The National Football Museum has a lean and
efficient staff structure and revenue cost base in comparison
with other national museums. The Museum employs nine full-time
and five part-time staff. The total running costs of the Museum
in the financial year 2002-03 will be £568,000. The Museum
would require a grant of £400,000 in order to allow free
admission to all.
3. SOURCES OF
REVENUE FUNDING
Who could or should fund The National Football
Museum? The key current and potential sources are discussed in
turn below.
3.1 Local authorities
The relevant local authorities, ie Preston Borough
Council and Lancashire County Council, already operate substantial
museum services of their own, and so neither authority is in a
position to provide substantial funding for The National Football
Museum.
3.2 Regional developments
The recently launched major report by Resource,
Renaissance in the Regions: a new vision for England's museums,
offers a valuable strategy for the development of regional museums.
It does not, and is not intended to address, funding issues relating
to national museums in the regions.
3.3 Sponsorship and other private sources
The Museum continues to be successful in raising
sponsorship and donations from private individuals and companies,
but these will never be sufficient to meet operational costs.
These private sources are also in general attracted for capital
developments, such as new exhibitions or purchases for the collections,
rather than for revenue funding.
3.4 The Football Bodies
FIFA have provided a great deal of support to
the project to date, but it is difficult for them to assist further.
They cannot be seen to favour one member country above over two
hundred others.
The English football bodies provided just two
per cent of the capital project. The FA Premier League has made
no contribution to either revenue or capital. The FA and the Football
League have loaned their collections but have yet to provide any
funding. Fourteen individual Football League clubs have made small
donations. The Football Foundation have provided £200,000
of capital funding and £100,000 of revenue, but all of this
is in the form of a secured loan. The PFA have made a grant of
£100,000.
Further support will hopefully be secured from
the football bodies. However, preserving and interpreting the
heritage of the game is not currently a key objective for any
of these bodies, which inevitably are focused on the current and
future development of the game. The increased support of the football
bodies will not in itself provide the required revenue funding
for the Museum.
3.5 HLF
The Museum would not have been created without
the capital grant of £9.3 million from the HLF. While HLF
does have some funds for revenue related projects, it does not
provide long-term, regular, revenue funding for museums.
3.6 Conclusion
Considered either individually or collectively,
these five possible sources will not meet either the short-term
or long-term needs of the Museum.
4. THE CASE
FOR DCMS SUPPORT
On what grounds could DCMS fund The National
Football Museum? Nine major arguments are raised in turn below.
4.1 Fulfilling the Mission of DCMS
The National Football Museum contributes significantly
to the fulfillment of the mission and objectives of DCMS in a
number of ways. The DCMS Annual Report 2002 states that:
"Our aim is to ensure everyone has the opportunity
to improve the quality of their lives through cultural and sporting
activities, and to champion the creative and leisure industries.
In pursuing this aim we seek to maximise the contribution that
culture, media and sport can make to the Government's wider social,
educational and economic objectives".
The National Football Museum is a unique institution,
in the sense that it links the cultural aims of DCMS to its sporting
aims, through the national sport. The National Football Museum
is both a national cultural and a national sporting institution.
The National Football Museum also has a unique
role to play in maximising the contribution that culture and sport
can make to the Government's wider social and educational objectives.
In terms of education, a great deal has already been achieved,
by means of a grant to develop the educational services of the
Museum, through the Museums and Galleries Education Programme
of the DfES. This project has demonstrated that football can be
used to develop the interest of students in almost all aspects
of the National Curriculum, particularly those students targeted
by social inclusion projects.
In its first few months of operation, the Museum
has also been involved in, or initiated, a number of groundbreaking
initiatives to combat social exclusion. This includes, as mentioned
above, a project funded by a grant of £100,000 from the New
Opportunities Fund, to digitise the collections and develop a
web site, working in partnership with a charity for young homeless
people. The Museum has hosted visits by over 700 local schoolchildren,
in partnership with the award-winning Preston-based anti-racism
project, the Respect All Football Fans Initiative (RAFFI). The
Museum has particularly strong potential through its subject matter
to reach out to the target groups identified by DCMS for social
inclusion initiatives.
4.2 Museum of National and International Status
The National Football Museum is, and will always
remain, the world's most significant national football museum,
as discussed in 1.6 above. The national status of the Museum is
demonstrated by the advice and support, and loan of items, that
it regularly gives to other museums and football clubs with regard
to the game's heritage. In the past year, for example, the Museum
has advised or supported the museums or planned museums at Liverpool
FC, Manchester United, Sheffield United, Leicester City, Chelsea,
West Ham United, Manchester City and Newcastle United. The Museum
has also advised on football exhibitions organised by museums
in Norwich, Coventry, Bolton and Stockport. We have also undertaken
a survey of the football items held in over 150 museums across
the country.
The international significance of the Museum
is demonstrated by the loan of items to Germany and the exhibition
in Japan, the advice and support we have given to the planned
national football museums in Norway, Germany and Wales, and the
advice given to FIFA on the display of items at FIFA House in
Zurich.
4.3 The World's Finest Football Collection
The Museum holds unquestionably the world's
finest football collection, as discussed in 1.4 above.
4.4 Unique New Museum Status
The National Football Museum has a unique status,
in that, as discussed in 1.1 above, it was the only major new
museum funded by HLF that was not developed as an out-station
of a pre-existing national museum or museum service. The exceptional
nature of The National Football Museum means that it has exceptional
funding needs.
It could be argued that given the significance
off football to the country's heritage, The National Football
Museum should have been established as an out-station of one of
the existing national museums, in the same way that the National
Railway Museum is a branch of the Science Museum. England does
not have a national history museum as such, and so this is effectively
the role of the national museums collectively. One option therefore
for the development of The National Football Museum is for it
to receive revenue funding from DCMS, under the aegis of one of
the national museums. Arguably the most appropriate of these would
be National Museums and Galleries on Merseyside.
4.5 Unique status re public revenue funding
The National Football Museum is the only one
of the nineteen registered national museums that does not receive
any public revenue funding.
4.6 The Museum of the People's Game
The National Football Museum is the museum of
the national game, the people's game, rather than a museum of
socially elite collections or subjects. It is the Museum of what
has spread from England to become the world's most popular sport.
It is therefore arguably as worthy of funding as any of the national
museums currently funded by DCMS.
4.7 DCMS Funding of Non-National Museums
DCMS currently provides funding to a number
of museums which neither DCMS nor Resource regard as of national
status, including: the Museum of London, the Horniman Museum and
the Geffrye Museum (all in London); Tyne & Wear Museums; and
the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. A case can be
made that any national museum, but particularly the Museum of
the national sport, is more worthy of support than non-national
museums.
DCMS recently produced a review of three of
these non-nationals, Review of the Museum of London, the Horniman
Museum and Gardens and the Geffrye Museum, Stage One Report (2001).
The Review commented that:
"3.2 In all three cases the sponsorship
of these non-national museums by central Government may be considered
anomalous, having arisen through accident of history rather than
by design.
4.1 The three London-based museums with which
we are concerned here have acquired their present status as government-funded
bodies because of changes in the structure of local government
in London over the last 40 years and because otherwise they would
have closed due to the absence of alternative sources of core
funding.
7.20 We conclude that at present no satisfactory
alternative to the existing arrangements for core funding of the
three museums is available".
There are no alternative sources of core funding
for The National Football Museum than support from DCMS.
4.8 Value for Money
The National Football Museum's current annual
running costs are £568,000. Expressed as a percentage of
the grants planned by DCMS for the financial year 2002-03 to a
number of museums (the running costs of these museums are significantly
higher), these are 1.5 per cent of that of the British Museum;
and 17 per cent, 9 per cent and 17 per cent of the non-national
Horniman Museum, Museum of London and Museum of Science and Industry
in Manchester, respectively.
As a percentage of DCMS's planned total grants
to Museums, Galleries and Libraries in 2002-03, ie £387,677,000,
the National Football Museum's running costs are 0.26 per cent
of the total.
4.9 Precedent
There is a powerful precedent for DCMS extending
revenue funding to a museum which has achieved national registration
status, and which is a museum of national significance, namely
the support given to the National Coal Mining Museum of England,
Wakefield, from 2001-02 onwards. The planned support by DCMS for
this Museum over the next two years is as follows: £2,072,000
in 2002-03, and £2,118,000 in 2003-04.
5 November 2002
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