HC Deb 19 December 1972 vol 848 cc1294-304

12 midnight

Mr. David Watkins (Consett)

After exciting events of the last two hours, I wish to raise the subject of the North of England Regional Open-air Museum. I am happy to have the opportunity to inform the House and to place on record the achievements and the great potential of that remarkable establishment. I also use this opportunity to mention certain problems regarding the financing of the project and administration problems arising particularly from the reorganisation of local government within the terms of the Local Government Act, 1972.

The museum is maintained by a consortium of local authorities, and it is the future of the joint committee of the consortium under the reorganisation which I particularly want to place some emphasis upon. It is a problem which has national implications for all projects maintained by consortia of local authorities facing reorganisation.

Before I deal specifically with the problems of reorganisation I shall describe this remarkable project and explain what it seeks to achieve. The museum is situated at Beamish Park, County Durham. The hall and the park, which extends to about 200 acres, is owned by the county council. The hall, which is a fine and historic house, is used as a college of adult education as well as part of the museum. It is an exciting, imaginative and unique project which seeks to depict in living form the development of the industrial revolution of the North-East of England. To that end it exhibits real houses, village shops, smithies, pubs and other buildings which have been assiduously and carefully demolished brick by brick from their original sites and similarly reconstructed in natural surroundings in Beamish Park.

Among the projects which are in the course of preparation is the laying down of an authentic tramway upon which will run real electric trams. The trams will operate to carry visitors around the site. The project will be in operation next summer. The re-construction of a Victorian railway station is also projected. We often look forward to the day when steam engines will be pulling vintage coaches around the splendid site on a Victorian or Edwardian-type railway.

There is also projected the sinking of a working model of a coalmine which visitors will be able to inspect by descending viewing galleries in comfort and safety. It is a measure of a changing situation in the nort-east of England that coalmines are becoming museum pieces.

Overall the museum will demonstrate the development of the industrial revolution and the life of the people during that period. It will demonstrate it in living form and, furthermore, in a setting of superb scenic beauty. It is potentially a great educational and tourist attraction in a region—the North-East—which needs every attraction it can get in view of its economic difficulties.

The potential can be gauged from the degree of public interest in the project. I was present on a wonderful spring afternoon when Lord Eccles opened the museum at a ceremony attended by more than 2,000 people. The first year of operation was 1971. Even in that year, when the museum was operating on only a small scale and with limited facilities, there were 50,000 visitors. To date in 1972 there have been over 90,000 visitors, and when final figures are totted up after the end of the year attendances during 1972 may well total 100,000. I stress that the project is still operating on a minor scale compared with its proposed development.

I understand that so great was the crush of visitors during the summer months that visitors sometimes had to queue for two hours to gain admission to see some exhibits. This shows the need for expenditure on facilities for visitors and for the handling of crowds.

I pay tribute to a fine band of volunteer workers who have played an enormous part in making the whole thing possible and also to Mr. Frank Atkinson, the director, whose vision undoubtedly brought the project into existence and whose never failing infectious enthusiasm is a great inspiration to all those associated with the project.

A unique asset for the region and for the country is being created. It is an asset with a great international potential.

I come now to the problems of future administration arising especially from the reorganisation of local government. The project is run by a joint committee of eight local authorities—the county councils of Durham and Northumberland and the county borough councils of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Gateshead, South Shields, Teesside, Darlington and Hartlepool. Sunderland was involved in the early stages of the project but unfortunately that great town fell upon evil days when the Tory Party gained control of the council and decided to opt out of its responsibilities and dissociate itself from the museum. I am happy to say that wiser counsels have prevailed and that as from 1st December Sunderland has rejoined the consortium of local authorities. Each local authority appoints members to the joint committee and contributes to the finances.

Another source of revenue is the admission charge. I do not wish to tread on delicate ground over the question of admission charges. I merely state as a fact that a charge is made and this is part of the revenue. The English Tourist Board has promised a grant of £17,000 towards the construction of the electric tramway, dependent upon the completion of the tramway in time for the next summer season.

All nine of the local authorities will be subject to major changes under local government reorganisation. The counties of Durham and Northumberland, for instance, will be much reduced in size, population and rateable value, and others will disappear completely as separate entities, notably the great historic city and county of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. The situation gives rise to great anxiety in the North-East about the future of the joint committee. There is anxiety, for instance, about who will be the successor authorities to the existing authorities when they either go out of existence or are very much changed, as in the case of the two county councils.

Can the Minister explain what will be the position under Section 206 of the Local Government Act, whereby both county and district councils can exercise museum functions? As county councils and county borough councils are the contributing and involved bodies, the whole consortium consists of top-tier authorities under the existing local government set-up, and it seems desirable that it should remain a matter for top-tier local authorities after reorganisation.

But there is a problem about the way in which both county and district councils can exercise museum functions. There also arises the question of whose property the museum and its exhibits will become after reorganisation. The whole matter of financing is bound up with the question of who will be the successor authorities. The Act does not appear to be clear on these matters. There are important national implications, and I hone that the Minister will be prepared to consider these fairly complex issues about the future of the consortium.

I turn finally to the question of finance. The project is chronically short of money. It is under-staffed as a result. It is the tremendous efforts of the large numbers of volunteers that have largely made up for the under-staffing by professionals. Considering the many calls on the revenue of the local authorities concerned, I feel that it is nothing less than heroic that the project has got as far as it has.

Over the whole situation looms the shadow of uncertainty as to who will be responsible after reorganisation. I hope above all that the Minister will give a firm assurance about the continuity of a joint committee. It would be disastrous if any delay occurred when local government reorganisation came into effect. A break in the continuity of the joint committee could very well entail the end of the whole project.

I also press the Minister for Government financial help. The Government must consider the project as part of their regional policies. The North-East of England requires thousands upon thousands of new jobs, but the Northern region also needs great cultural and tourist attractions, such as the museum, to inject spending power into its economy. The museum provides a unique opportunity with a vast potential in that direction.

One of the requirements concerns handling the ever-growing number of visitors. There is a need for a visitor's centre, which would act as a focal point, explain to people what the museum is all about, and direct them around the site in such a way as not to cause undue congestion. But the cost of providing such a centre is estimated at about £300,000, and while the region has already made heroic efforts from its own resources in providing a museum in the first place, its resources are not sufficient to cope with the kind of expenditure which is necessary for the expansion and continuing viability of the project.

I therefore press for a grant and I hope that the Minister will not give me a bromide answer and say that we must await the recommendations of the Eccles Committee about matters of this sort because irrespective of what that committee recommends and when it recommends it, it is still the Government that decides on the allocation of money for projects of this nature. I hope that we shall not have to wait too long for a decision.

I hope that the Government will recognise the importance of this great project and will appreciate the problems which I have sought to outline—the overall financial problem and the administration problem arising from the reorganisation of local government; something which must be treated with some urgency because time is running along in this respect. I hope that the Minister will indicate an active interest in seeking to resolve these problems.

12.16 a.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Eldon Griffiths)

In his opening remarks the hon. Member for Consett (Mr. David Watkins) drew a fascinating picture of this unique and very imaginative project, the museum at Beamish Park. I am very grateful to him for the eloquent way in which he described its attractions. I have been to the North-East on many occasions in the last two years, in connection with the reorganisation of local government, clean air policy, with roads and with many other aspects of my Department's work in that area. I have not, however, had the pleasure of seeing the museum, and in view of the hon. Member's glowing description of the achievements there and the prospect of the tramways, the Victorian railway station and the model of the coal mine I shall certainly do my utmost on the next occasions when I am in the North-East, if there is time, to see something of Beamish Park for myself.

The hon. Gentleman said, rightly, that the museum was brought into being by the combined efforts of eight county councils and county borough councils which are anxious that the initiative they have taken and the momentum they have at Beamish Park is not lost as a result of the reorganisation of local government, which, of course, will result in the disappearance of the constituent authorities which form the present joint committee and under the aegis of which the museum operates.

For their part the Government would wish to ease the transition from the existing system to the new one. I cannot pretend at this stage to have cut and dried answers on all the points connected with the future of the museum. I cannot do that partly because the Local Government Act has not long been on the Statute Book, and there are many consequences of the reorganisation which still require to be examined in detail so that the changes may be smoothly implemented in 1974. I am also unable to provide all the answers partly because the arrangements which should be made in cases of this kind are, above all, matters which can be, and which I believe will be, decided by the local authority.

Let me indicate the points which I believe to be relevant to the achievement of a smooth transition in this case. As the hon. Member said the museum is housed at Beamish Park in the county of Durham. It is managed by the joint committee which in turn is responsible for the ultimate finance. As a result of reorganisation, the existing county councils, county boroughs and county district councils will cease to exist at 31st March 1974, and this poses a number of problems. One was raised by the hon. Member under the provisions of Section 206; namely, the concurrent powers at the first tier and at the district level for running and managing museums. I see no difficulty here. It merely provides the power whereby authorities can agree among themselves where it is most appropriate that the museum management should be located. I would have thought that in this instance there would be no real difficulty in the new authorities agreeing together on the management of Beamish Park.

The second problem raised by the hon. Member related essentially to the ownership of the land and the premises in which the museum is housed, and, I understand, the ownership of the collection of exhibits attaching thereto. That is, as he put it, the property problem; in other words one, of who it is, after the reorganisation, will own the property which now belongs to the local authorities. Of course, "property" in this connection includes not only the land and the physical property but cash balances, rights, obligations and liabilities of all kinds.

The hon. Gentleman properly indicated that of course this is a national problem, that it applies everywhere, that it is not unique to the case of Beamish Hall. It is precisely because it is a national problem and a complex one that the Local Government Act provides that the Secretary of State shall by order transfer the property of existing authorities to the new ones. But because so much property is involved across the whole country, and because it is obviously such a complex matter, varying from one area to another, we shall, of course, expect to have very full consultation with the local authorities on the general principles that should be followed in making such orders. We should also expect to consult particular authorities when it comes to individual properties which might need to be dealt with specially and perhaps even by name. We shall certainly do this as necessary before making any order with respect to the transfer of the properties at Beamish Hall.

So the whole museum will, I am sure, be transferred to the new authorities on 1st April 1974 as a result of an order or orders made by the Secretary of State. My initial assumption is that Beamish Hall will be transferred to the ownership of the new Durham County Council, but I must stress that this is no more than an initial assumption at the present stage, because there needs to be, as I am sure the hon. Gentleman agrees, detailed consultation with the authorities concerned, whose views we are anxious to have, and it may even be that some special provision will need to be made within the order affecting the museum and the items which constitute the collection of exhibits.

The third problem relates to the future of the consortium or the joint committee which came together under the agreement of June 1970 to share responsibility for the management and financing of the museum. I should say here—I think the hon. Gentleman well knows it—that there are across the country a very great number of joint committees and consortia operating in local government to undertake very many functions, and they are, of course, actively concerned, as he is, with the impact of reorganisation upon them. In sonic instances these joint committees have come into being for the specific purpose of organising the transitional period, and in some cases the need for them will disappear because the constituent existing authorities will all be merged into a single authority. So there will not be any continuing joint committee. In other instances it will be necessary to provide for the continued existence of such committees till the authorities concerned make other arrangements for the future under their own authority.

Section 263 of the Local Government Act provides for the continued existence of joint committees as appropriate in these circumstances; in other words, they can go on after 1st April 1974. This, I am bound to say to the hon. Gentleman, is a general long-stop provision which, in effect, substitutes the new authorities for their predecessors. Under this approach the assumption is that the new authorities will simply step into the shoes of their predecessors and assume all the rights and all the obligations under the arrangements which existed immediately before reorganisation took full effect.

In the last resort this provision in Section 263 could be operated to preserve the arrangements under the existing agreement affecting the open-air museum at Beamish Park. It could be done that way. So there is a long-stop provision if it should become necessary. I recognise that where one has a general provision of the kind as in Section 263 there might be complications in applying it to the particular items of property and circumstances of the consortium and the properties at Beamish Hall. But I can assure the hon. Gentleman that there is machinery within the Act for getting round any of these uncertainties or difficulties which might arise. The Act contains a very wide order-making power enabling my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State to make such supplementary and consequential provisions as are needed to enable the Act to be implemented and to facilitate the transition to the new system. The order-making power I have referred to under Section 254 could be used in this case.

I must emphasise too, other points. This is a situation in which the local authorities will need to decide for themselves how the museum should be operated in the future, and I would suggest that, if they have not already begun, consultations about how they wish to see it managed after next April should be started as soon as possible. Naturally, the Secretary of State will be mindful of their views, their judgments and their guidance in making any orders to facilitate transition.

The hon. Gentleman went on to speak about finance. He will understand that there are no central Government grants; they are not available; the House gave no power to the Government to make grants for museums. I understand, however, that the open-air museum has had financial help from the Victoria and Albert Museum and from local industrial interests. I was glad to hear tonight of the proposed assistance from the English Tourist Board in respect of the electric tramway.

I understand full well what the hon. Gentleman said about the need in regional policy to enrich the cultural life of an area, but I am bound, and entitled, to remind him that in the North-East my Department has given very material assistance in respect of derelict land clearance, abolition of eyesores, tree planting schemes, and general improvement schemes, benefits which may be among the reasons why the North-East is now attracting more tourists, and why it is becoming known not only in this country but in Europe as an area which is picking itself up from the obsolescence and scars of the past and taking on a very much more attractive aspect.

To sum up briefly the position—

The Question having been proposed after Ten o'clock, and the debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. DEPUTY SPEAKER adjourned the House without

Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned at half-past Twelve o'clock.