HC Deb 22 July 1991 vol 195 cc748-9
27. Mr. Knox

To ask the Minister for the Arts whether he will be making an official visit to the 1991 Museums Association annual conference.

Mr. Renton

I shall visit the 1991 Museums Association annual conference in Newcastle tomorrow to make the opening address.

Mr. Knox

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the Government's plural funding policy for the arts has given museums and galleries much greater freedom, enabling them to be more dynamic and consumer conscious?

Mr. Renton

I very much agree with my hon. Friend's comments. That is a point that I hope to make in my address to the Museums Association in Newcastle tomorrow. Our plural funding policy has enabled museums to attract sponsorship from the private sector—for instance, from the Leverhulme trust to the science museum, the Wolfson Foundation to the British museum and Agnew's to the national gallery, all of which have come forward in recent weeks and enabled the museums to undertake a number of ventures, including redecoration, refurbishment and putting on new exhibitions, which they would not otherwise have been able to undertake.

Mrs. Dunwoody

Is the Minister aware that, with the laudable exception of the British museum, more and more museums are now charging for entry? If they do not charge they threaten by suggesting a minimum payment of £3. That is having a direct effect on the number of children who can go to museums. Is the Minister not ashamed of the contribution that he is making to the poverty of many of our children's cultural life?

Mr. Renton

The hon. Lady's remarks are wholly misguided. As my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Shoreham (Sir R. Luce) said when he introduced that policy, it has been left to the individual museum or gallery to decide whether to charge. Those who have decided to charge, like the natural history museum and the science museum, are now putting on remarkably exciting exhibitions to which children are going. I opened the science lab exhibition at the science museum last week, and it was filled with children. I suggest that the hon. Lady goes there herself to see just how wrong her remarks are.