Supplementary written evidence submitted
by Dr Simon Thurley on behalf of English Heritage (arts 238)
Subsequent to my appearance before the Committee
on 19 October, there have obviously been a number of important
developments with regard to the funding of English Heritage and
the wider heritage sector as a result of the Comprehensive Spending
Review. I thought it would be worthwhile outlining the implication
of these, and the actions that English Heritage proposes to take
in order to maintain and protect the services we provide.
Government announced on 20 October that English Heritage's
grant in aid would be reduced by 32%. While we have been preparing
for some time for the likelihood of reduced funding, the final
figure was significantly more than we had anticipated. It has
necessitated some very difficult decisions on our part—after
much discussion and analysis, the Chair and Commissioners have
agreed that we should prioritise those areas that we regard as
being at the core of our responsibilities and for which there
are no alternative providers. These are:
— Our planning advice service to local
authorities. This is particularly important in the light of the
likely cuts to local authority funding and services.
— Designation—identifying our heritage
and its protection through listing and scheduling. This is an
activity that no other organisation is in a position to be able
to do.
— The maintenance and conservation of the
properties in our case, and for which we have a responsibility
to look after for future generations.
This approach obviously means that we will have
to seek savings elsewhere in the organisation, although given
the seriousness of the cut in funding we are still at a relatively
early stage in our planning. In addition to further administration
and efficiency savings where possible, we intend to look closely
at our overlap of activities with other organisations, reduce
the total budget for our grant schemes by around one third (a
reduction of approximately £11m per year) and to examine
ways of reorganising our current staff structure. We expect this
reorganisation to involve around 200 staff redundancies, including
a number of senior managers. We are also examining further ways
of saving money, including changes to our casework systems and
changes to the opening hours of our properties.
There is no doubt that the cut in funding will
have a dramatic effect on the way that English Heritage is able
to carry out its responsibilities. We are particularly concerned
that when combined with the likely reductions to heritage services
in local authorities this will lead to significant pressure on
the historic environment. At the same time, we have had no choice
but to reduce our research capacity—thereby reducing our
ability to better investigate and understand England's heritage.
We aim to publish a Corporate Plan early in
2011 which will set out and explain what and how we will operate
over the next four years. At the same time, we are discussing
with other organisations how to minimise the impact of reduced
funding on the historic environment.
December 2010
Supplementary written evidence submitted
by the Arts Council England (arts 240)
SELECT COMMITTEE
FOLLOW-UP
I am writing with the additional information
that you have requested following the evidence session that I
attended with my Chair, Dame Liz Forgan, on 25 January 2011.
How many works in the Arts Council Collection
have not been shown in the last 10 years?
4,102 pieces from the Arts Council Collection have
not been displayed within the past 10 years.
With a loan rate of 20-30%, we believe that the Arts
Council Collection works extremely hard in comparison to other
national collections and we are already looking at how we can
better market the collection to ensure that more work is displayed
and greatly improving digital access to the collection.
We also need to ensure that at a time when we are
acquiring functions for museums, that the Arts Council Collection
continues to be administered with reference to the Museum Association's
guidelines governing national collections, including those about
de-accessioning of art works. The de-accessioning of parts of
the collection could pose financial or legal difficulties as well
as compromising the integrity and reputation of the collection.
What was Moss Cooper's severance package?
Moss Cooper, Director of Capital Services, was
made redundant on 30 June 2006 as part of a major rationalisation
of the National Lottery funded Capital Services Team, which during
2006 was reduced from a staff team of 28 and which now comprises
a Capital Services Team of four posts. As with other staff made
redundant as part of this restructuring process, Mr Cooper received
the statutory redundancy payment he was entitled to as outlined
in the Arts Council's redundancy terms agreed with our recognised
trade union, Unite and received no other additional payment on
the termination of his employment. Due to employee confidentiality
under the Data Protection Act and other legal considerations,
we are not able to disclose the actual sum Mr Cooper received.
I have checked and can confirm that as part
of this process Moss Cooper was not commissioned to write a report
about The Public in West Bromwich.
What is your assessment of "disproportionate
cost"? (re: retrieving documents written by Moss Cooper)
When responding to the questions arising out
of my evidence session on the 12 October, we used the expenditure
limit for Parliamentary Questions as an indicator of disproportionate
cost, which is currently set at £850. As I stressed in my
letter of the 4 November, we have five years worth of records
on The Public in West Bromwich and we consider that the time and
expense of retrieving these records and identifying whether they
contain any reports by Moss Cooper that we don't know about would
have exceeded this limit.
You said that you would e-mail Moss Cooper to
ask about the reports he wrote. Have you done this? If so, what
was the response?
We have contacted Moss Cooper asking whether he wrote
a report on The Public as part of his leaving arrangements with
the Arts Council.
He thinks that there may be confusion between the
writing of a "Moss Cooper report" and a major assessment
milestone of what was then called C\plex (the former trading name
for The Public) undertaken by the Capital Department, published
in 2003-04.
He also said that prior to going on sabbatical
in February/March 2005 he wrote a paper for Peter Hewitt and Keith
Harrison on capital projects. This was a modelling exercise looking
at the likely revenue trends of the capital projects that had
completed, and also that were due to complete within the next
five years. Included in this modelling would have been the likely
future revenue needs of C/Plex, along with the needs of many other
capital projects.
We are locating these within our archive and
will send you copies or relevant extracts when they have been
located.
Please let me know if you require any clarification
in response to the above or if there is any further information
that I can provide you with to assist you with your inquiry on
funding for the arts and heritage.
Alan Davey
Chief Executive
18 February 2011
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