HL Deb 22 November 1971 vol 325 cc819-34

3.4 p.m.

THE PAYMASTER GENERAL (VISCOUNT ECCLES)

My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. This is a small, one-page Bill, designed to achieve a very limited object: to give four museums power to charge for entrance because, unlike the other national museums and galleries, it is uncertain whether these four have this power under their existing arrangements. Small the Bill may be, and behind it the money is small—it is really all about 10p. Nevertheless it has aroused very considerable and very welcome interest in museums. I say this because when I entered upon my present responsibilities I knew something about the purposes and needs of our museums and how necessary it was to add a new concern for the general public to the traditional care for the scholar and connoisseur. Now I find that I greatly underestimated what we have to do, and that the size of the problem is very far from being well understood. For this reason the argument over charges is welcome, because it is making people think about museums when they were not thinking about them before.

Now may I turn to the Bill itself? It provides that four museums shall have the power to charge. It does not specify the scale of charges because that is a matter of arrangement between the Government and the museums. The museums accept that charging is now part of the Government's policy. I think I can show in the course of my speech that, however strongly any trustee at first reacted against charges—and that I understand, because there was no time to inform them why we had taken the decision—there are solid reasons for thinking that the introduction of charges will be to the advantage of the museums themselves. I should like to thank the trustees and staffs of the museums for the way in which, after the brusque opening of this affair, they have collaborated with us in working out some very difficult and detailed arrangements for the introduction of charges. I will come later to the reasons why I think this is in their own interests. I wish to say a word first about subsection (2) of Clause 1. This applies to Scotland, and is only necessary because the Charities Act 1960 does not apply to Scotland. If it did, we should not need subsection (2). The Secretary of State would then have the power, which my right honourable friend Mrs. Thatcher has now, to vary the trusts when changed circumstances were seen to justify such action.

Your Lordships will remember that the Nathan Committee was appointed in 1950 to examine the law and practice relating to charitable trusts. The Committee reported that further statutory provision should be made for varying or revoking a trust when circumstances had changed and it was advisable to bring the conditions of the trust into line with the new situation. That recommendation was embodied in the 1960 Act, and the relevant clause is now used every day of the week to overcome difficulties raised by the passage of time.

I have been informed by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Scotland that there are collections in the Scottish museums in regard to which it can reasonably be maintained that they were given to the institution on the understanding that they would be exhibited free to the public, at least on certain days. These collections are: first, that transferred to the National Gallery of Scotland by the heirs of Sir James Erskine of Torrie in 1845; secondly, the Vaughan collection of Turner drawings received in 1900; and thirdly, a collection transferred to the Royal Scottish Museum in 1855 by the Edinburgh Town Council. This latter collection is scattered all over the Museum and could not now be identified.

Your Lordships may ask what has happened to justify varying the conditions of these trusts. The answer is that in the last hundred years the costs of maintaining and enlarging the museums concerned have increased to such an extent as to bring about what amounts to a new situation. The public is concerned not with these three bequests alone but with the whole of the collections. How are they to be maintained and enlarged? The sums of money required for these two purposes are now so considerable that they have to be compared with other forms of domestic expenditure. The Government do not have a bottomless purse, and therefore we think it reasonable, in circumstances so different from 1845, 1855 and 1900, to ask a small contribution towards the growing expenditure from those who now enjoy the collections as a whole. This is the real issue before us. Do the museums require large new sums of money and, if so, having regard to all the other claims on the Exchequer, and especially the other arts, what is the most sensible and fair way to finance as much as possible all these activities?

I suppose it is common ground between us that a great deal more money could with advantage be devoted to the spread of the arts, not just in London and to our famous companies and institutions of international repute, but also across the whole country and to popular art as well as to the sophisticated and experimental forms which demand large subsidies but cannot be expected to attract a mass audience. With limited resources such as we have the problem is how to pursue a policy of expansion in so many directions at once. In the case of the fine arts, it is accepted that the costs should be shared between the general body of the taxpayers and the users of the particular art in question. No one expects the seats at the Coliseum, the Aldwych or the Festival Hall to be free. No one expects to go round Hampton Court or the Tower of London for nothing. In all such instances it is accepted by the public and by Parliament that the cost should be shared between the taxpayers and the users.

My noble friend Lord Robbins, in all article he wrote on the political economy of the arts, misunderstands the analogy between the fine arts and the museums. Charging has got nothing to do with keeping people out, of equating demand with supply; we want more money to be spent on the arts in general, and one way to get that is to share the rising costs between the general body of the taxpayers and those who use the particular form of art which appeals to them. This is done in the subsidised theatre and opera; it is done at places of historic interest and at many museums. Coming to the national museums and galleries, it may be that if all their services had been considered by all sections of opinion to be adequate, and nothing extra was urgently demanded for gallery space, offices, amenities, equipment and staff, or for acquisitions, then perhaps no Government would have thought it essential to introduce charges. But none of your Lordships would be content with such a complacent and standstill position.

It is only too well known that the museums are drawing bigger crowds every year, and that the urgent problem is how to anticipate the demands of a larger and better informed public. The kind of publicity which is at this moment being given to the British Museum for the first time —and I am glad of it—is bound to be reflected in larger attendances and more demands on the staff. If Sir Mortimer Wheeler had been giving these television talks the queue of people would have stretched from the Tottenham Court Road to the door of the museum, as it did when he gave only three talks on the Temple of Mithras. We have not given publicity to the museums yet: when we do so we shall see the result. But it is no good looking at one museum alone; I must consider the service as a whole. There are two related sets of priorities that have to be resolved. With the help of the best expert advice I can secure I am trying to sort these out and to turn them into long-term programmes with finance and timetables so that my successors can inherit in a better shape than I did the basic materials for their policies.

The problems of priority are, first, how, if we can get more money, should it be spent between buildings, equipment and staff on the one hand, and acquisitions on the other; and secondly, how to be sure that the expenditure will be fair as between London and the Provinces. One would like to be able to do everything at once, but that is not possible. In all the arts the aim must be to continue to subsidise the worthwhile activities which we subsidise now, and then to direct such new resources as become available to the neglected priorities. I have no doubt that in the field of the museums this means putting greater emphasis on buildings, equipment and staff and greater emphasis on the Provinces. Very big sums of money would be involved if we were to underwrite a programme that came anywhere near doing justice to these two neglected priorities.

In spite of this background it may be that some of your Lordships care so much for the principle of not charging at the national museums and galleries that you would be prepared to forgo expansion in building or in major grants for new acquisitions in London and the Provinces. If so, I can only say that that is not the Government's view; we think a more ambitious national policy is urgent, and it appears to us that if the users of museums, like the users of the other arts, make some small contribution towards the rising expenditure it is going to be much easier for us to get new money. The choice, as we see it, is between no charges with no adequate expansion and a modest charge with expansion both in London and the Provinces.

It would be wrong to speak about expansion without saying something more about current costs, which are worrying. In all the arts these are rising fast, partly because the arts are labour-intensive. I should think the costs are rising by at least 10 per cent. a year—just for the arts to stand still where they are now. The prices of the scats at theatres and concerts halls are being raised all round, not to ration the seats as my noble friend Lord Robbins seems to think, but to keep the subsidies down. If we charged the museum visitor the same proportion of the costs which the subsidised theatres and concerts and operas obtain from their public, the museum entrance charge would have to be about 50p. That is one half of the £1 which every visit to a museum now costs the taxpayers.

The museums are acutely aware of how the costs of display and security are rising. The special exhibitions which they put on with such skill and imagination are a case in point. Ten years ago the average charge was about half-a-crown. Five years ago it was something like four shillings. Now it is much nearer 30p.

For my part I regret very much that special exhibitions have had to become so expensive and so socially divisive. These temporary displays illustrate some artist or period or theme. They often attract visitors just because they are temporary, and because they convey a sense of life that the permanent collections may lack. They make converts to museums. I hope that in time, when the system of charging is well established, consideration will be given to including entrance to special exhibitions in the charge at the main doors of the museum. I was interested to read in the same article by my noble friend Lord Robbins that when there is any danger of overcrowding at special exhibitions at the National Gallery they never hesitate to charge an entrance fee to keep people out. My Lords, I do not want to keep people out. The object of charging is to make it easier to secure the money to make museums places which more people can visit in comfort.

That brings me to a number of objections to charges, which I should like to anticipate in the closing part of my remarks. Those who are so certain that charging is wrong in principle—

LORD ROBBINS

My Lords, I am sorry to interrupt the noble Viscount but his argument naturally has a very strong intellectual appeal so far as I am concerned. I should like to hear from his lips whether, in the event of the financial situation becoming easier, he would advise the authorities of Covent Garden, where I happen to be Secretary of the Finance Committee, to reduce the charges by 50 per cent.

VISCOUNT ECCLES

My Lords, Covent Garden is a very special case. It is the one case which obviously the noble Lord knows very well and which is at the back of his article. He there says that the prices at Covent Garden are what they are because otherwise there would be large queues and he much prefers to ration people by the purse. But he does not realise that in the case of (shall we say?) Hampton Court there is always room for thousands more people and yet we have charges. Charges are put on to help bear part of the cost of a rapidly growing institution or company. What Covent Garden should do if the financial position became easier we must see at the time; but I think the noble Lord knows that I am about to consider an enormous bill from Covent Garden for building, and he had better get his building done first before he talks about reducing the price of seats.

LORD ROBBINS

My Lords, without wishing to enter into an argument, which would be unseemly, with the noble Viscount at this stage, I should like to point out to him that in the article to which he refers I actually inform the readers that charges were made at Hampton Court. I have the article here.

VISCOUNT ECCLES

I am very glad the noble Lord did, my Lords; but if he did—as I am sure he did—then that really goes against his general argument, which was that there was no case for a charge where the public could not be described as overcrowded to the point of discomfort. If he thinks about that he will see that a large part of the paper he wrote does not tie up.

LORD ROBBINS

My Lords, I will deal with that later.

VISCOUNT ECCLES

My Lords, I have got it; I will quote it later if the noble Lord wishes.

It is said that charging will keep away a large number of visitors. We do not know whether that is true or how true it is. The evidence we have is rather the other way. When charges were put on and increased at places such as Apsley House, the National Folk Museum of Wales, the Museum at Norwich, or National Trust properties, the attendances, far from going down, actually rose. I do not pretend to give the House the reasons for that but it is a fact. Last year, for example, the National Trust I think in many cases raised their charges and they had the record number of over 3 million visitors who paid the record sum of well over half a million pounds. So I think the answer to those who fear that some people will be deterred by a charge of 10p is that, unless we spend more on the museums, in a few years much larger numbers will be deterred, at the holiday periods at any rate, by overcrowding.

Then there is a very curious argument that because a picture has been bought with public funds it is wrong to charge future generations to see it. The best answer I can give to that is to congratulate the last Labour Government on finding £386,000 for rebuilding the Jewel House at the Tower of London. The money of course came from public funds. When the building was finished and opened, were the public let in free? Not at all. The Labour Minister doubled the charges compared to what they were before the building was put up. And what happened? Each year the number of visitors has markedly increased. I think this will happen here, too; the attendances will also rise like that when the new extensions to the national galleries and museums are completed, although I hope we shall not imitate our predecessors and promptly double the charge.

Next, there are those who say they would not object to charges if all the museums and galleries offered at least one free day a week. This is a very attractive suggestion. We went into it very carefully and I must ask your Lordships to allow me a moment or two to explain why, with very great regret, we have to turn it down. We all agree that it would be popular to have one free day, especially at the weekend. Of the two reasons why we cannot do this, one the Government share with many of the museums, and the other—the net sum of money we wish to collect, and the tariff of charges for collecting it—falls entirely within the Government's policy.

The museums themselves differ on whether a free day would be acceptable from their angle—that is, from the angle of overcrowding and security. This is not a simple matter at all. There must always be a level at which overcrowding frustrates the purpose of a visit. That level has been reached at some museums, especially at weekends, in the recent summer months, and the Government think that overcrowding is bound to become more frequent. Of course, no one can be absolutely certain about the rate of increase in the number of visitors in the years to come, but the signs are that the rise will not only continue but probably become even sharper than in the past. The tourist trade are in no doubt at all. Look at the number of new hotels being built in London; look at the number of package holidays which are being arranged, and the confident forecasts of the British Travel and Holidays Association. But, even more important, we ourselves, by encouraging schools to take a steadily greater interest in museums, are creating an ever larger attendance. I support those who think that these educational policies, together with the growing interest in foreign cultures, will have a snowball effect upon museum attendances.

I do not know whether any of your Lordships have had the experience in one of our museums of being in a particular room or gallery when it was seriously overcrowded. The discomfort for oneself is of course obvious. I took one of my grandchildren the other day to such a place and she was frightened and I had to take her out. But another result is that the warders cannot see what is happening. The danger of damage or theft is correspondingly increased, and this is a very real problem which we cannot overlook. If on six days of the week a charge were made and the seventh was a free day, it stands to reason that the attendance on the free day would be larger than at present—perhaps even 25 per cent. or 30 per cent. above the average. Kenwood is an example which points very much to an even higher figure. It is precisely this fear which causes some of the museums to think that a free day would not be in the public interest. I support them from practical experience. Nor do I think we could have free days at one museum and not at another, especially if the number of visitors at all museums is going rapidly to increase, which seems now as certain as anything can be.

The second argument against a free day is financial. For reasons I have explained, we have decided to ask the users of the national museums for a contribution of £1 million net a year. On present figures, if there were a free day we could not keep the basic charge for 10 months down to lop for adults and 5p for children and old age pensioners. The basic charge would then have to be 20p, since it is not practicable to charge any sum in between, because that would require machines which handle two coins of different sizes and would be much more complicated. But, my Lords, in a few years' time, when we have the results of the proposed scale of charges, we can look at the case for free days and at all the other variations that have been put up to us. All I can say to-day is that I should not be honest if I did not tell the House that on account of overcrowding and security there is not, and ought not to be, any prospect of a free day at the weekend, unless and until we can enlarge the museums to an extent that will overtake the rise in the number of visitors at peak periods.

My final point is addressed to those who would be content with charges if the proceeds went straight back to the museum. This is what in fact will happen, if not directly, none the less certainly taking the national museums as a group. The annual increase in their vote will have to exceed by a comfortable margin what they collect in charges, and I can assure noble Lords that the introduction of charges will be an effective argument for obtaining more money for their rising requirements.

An example which has been in the news recently is the special grant of £380,000 offered by the Government towards the appeal for the Titian. We hope very much that the appeal will succeed. If it was in order (which I am sure it is not) I would actually be begging for money in your Lordships' House. But the estimated gross revenue from charges at the National Gallery is £150,000 a year. That is less than half the amount of this special grant, and of course the building and maintaining of the extensions which are now authorised to that Gallery will call for much larger sums. All this money has to be provided when charges in the social services are being raised and when the claims of those services might be held by important sections of the public, and of another place, to be even stronger than those of the museums.

This small Bill opens the way to large improvements in the museum service of the country. We are going to join the European Community. Your Lordships may think that this renders it all the more important that our cultural contribution should be as good as we can make it. We all know that the collections in our museums are without rival.

The challenge is to secure resources to make their display and the other services and amenities equally outstanding, and to further this objective we are asking the visitors to contribute towards the expenditure, which has to rise if the objective is to be attained. I know that a few people who now visit museums will be unable or unwilling to pay the charge. That will be a loss which I deplore and I am sure all your Lordships deplore, but on the other side of the account we can look forward to the total number of visitors and school parties increasing year by year. Surely this is the end which we must put first, and if anyone still objects to charges it must, I think, be because the full extent of the position of the museums, not only in London but also in the Provinces, has not yet been appreciated.

My Lords, I hope that I have explained what the position in the museum service is and how we believe that this modest Bill will make a real difference to putting it right. I beg to move.

Moved, That the Bill be now read 2ª.— (Viscount Eccles.)

3.36 p.m.

LORD STRABOLGI

My Lords, it is customary in this House to thank the Minister for explaining a Bill, but I am afraid I am not able to do so on this occasion as the noble Viscount, the Paymaster General, has hardly referred to the Bill before your Lordships at all. I would, however, thank him for explaining to us his policy in general and how he views his responsibilities. I should like, though, to turn to the Bill before us. This is an enabling Bill. As the Long Title says, it is a Bill to remove impediments to the making of charges for admission to the national museums and galleries in Great Britain. In actual fact, the Bill lists only four out of 18 institutions set out in the White Paper. The Government consider, I gather, that they have sufficient legal and financial power to oblige the other 14 institutions, which include the National Gallery of London and the National Museum of Wales, to charge entrance fees, in many ways against their wishes. The noble Viscount has therefore been able to avoid Parliamentary legislation except in the cases of these four. But although the Bill is less than a quarter of the package, we on this side of the House take the strongest exception to it.

It is a mean and contemptible little Bill—a Bill that seeks to evade the issue. We should have thought more of the Government if they had come frankly to Parliament with a Bill that set out the charging scheme in detail, so that this could have been subjected to full examination by both Houses. But no, my Lords; the Government want trustees to shoulder responsibility for this unpopular and regrettable scheme and to pull the chestnuts out of the lire for them. However, for my part I shall not advise my colleagues to divide. There are compelling reasons why we should not divide on the Second Reading of a Government Bill. I realise that the Bill is starting its passage in this House, so we should not be attempting to reject a Bill previously agreed to by the other place. Nevertheless, this House does exercise re-traint in regard to Government Bills. The reason is, of course, that these Bills emanate from the elected Government, and the argument against voting them down is basically the same as the argument against voting down Government Bills that have been passed by the other place. I understand that there has not been a single case since the War when this House has divided on a Government Bill introduced first into the House of Lords. But although we shall not seek to divide the House, this is for constitutional reasons and not because we do not feel very strongly about it.

I should, however, like to give the House notice that at the Committee stage I shall be moving an Amendment which will seek to give a measure of Parliamentary control to these arrangements. This Amendment will require the Government to lay on the Table a statement which will be subject to the Negative Resolution procedure, specifying the charges in Great Britain and ensuring that none of the museums and galleries can charge until this statement has been before each House of Parliament for 40 days.

I should like to turn now to the four institutions in question. The first is the British Museum, the greatest museum in the world, as the noble Viscount once called it, and rightly, during one of his previous existences. The original Act of 1753 setting up the British Museum stipulated free access, and the Museum has been free through good times and bad for over 200 years—indeed, ever since it first opened at Montague House in 1759. This long tradition of free entry is a very fine one, and it is tragic to think that it is to be ended. I am glad to see the Chairman of the British Museum Trustees, the noble Lord, Lord Trevelyan, in his place this afternoon. I am not clear whether the Museum's Trustees agree with their colleagues the Trustees of the National Galleries in London and in Edinburgh, who have announced their objections publicly, as the Museum's Trustees have remained silent except to say that they would take the views of Parliament into account, but I venture to think that this must be a sad day for them, as it is indeed for many of us. May I say that I am very much looking forward to the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Trevelyan, and also, of course, to the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Robbins, who is a Trustee of the National Gallery.

The National Galleries of Scotland used to charge on one or two days a week, but the Standing Commission on Museums and Galleries recommended that fees should be abolished, and since 1938 they have been free. In their report last March the Trustees of the Gallery in Edinburgh said: We believe that the proposed charge cannot but be damaging to the interests which we have been appointed to protect, and that the tradition of free entry is of great value ". The noble Viscount, Lord Eccles, spoke about a free day, and to my mind he seemed to contradict himself, because earlier in his speech he had denied that he wished in any way to keep the public out; but then he went on to say that one of the reasons for not having a free day was to restrict attendances. I realise that there may be difficulties in some instances, with security and so on, but surely this is a matter for the trustees of the gallery. If the Government appoint responsible and distinguished men to run these institutions for them, surely they should be allowed as individuals to make the best decisions in the interests of their particular gallery. The Trustees of the National Gallery in their last report said that there should be at least one free day a week, and I believe this view is shared by two other galleries in London and the two Scottish galleries mentioned in the Bill.

I should like to ask about exemptions. First, I make no excuse for putting in a further plea for all old age pensioners. The Government went some way to meet us over this matter when they announced in the other place last June that the charge for retirement pensioners will be 5p at all times, including July and August. The Government also said that they would look into the question of giving free admittance to pensioners receiving supplementary benefits, on production of their pension books. I realise that there are administrative difficulties as there are three books, one for the basic pension, one for the basic and supplementary and one for the supplementary pension only, and that as a matter of policy all books have identical covers. This is surely right, and it has been the policy of successive Governments to ensure that these books are indistinguishable when the pension is collected. But would it not, therefore, be simpler and better and less embarrassing for them to exempt all retirement pensioners? Perhaps the noble Viscount will let us have his views when he replies.

Then there is the question of children. The noble Viscount spoke about school children being allowed in free in prearranged parties, and this of course is welcomed; and he looked forward eagerly to the number of these parties increasing. But not all children want to go in pre-arranged school parties. Indeed, the child who feels most drawn to museums and who probably derives most benefit from them is often the rather individualistic and sensitive child who is happiest visiting them on his own rather than as part of a school crocodile. The charge for children not in organised parties will also deter family visits, especially for the poorer families and for those who live some distance away. When I went to the British Museum last Saturday it was full of people, usually two parents with three, sometimes more, children, and it is going to cost them a lot of money when they have to pay. I therefore urge the Government to think again and to reconsider the children. The sum involved is only about £150,000, and I should have thought that the educational benefits accruing to the nation as a whole from such a concession would be well worth the comparatively small amount involved.

May I also ask the Government whether they could consider exempting disabled people, including crippled children. When my noble friend, Lady Lee of Asheridge, who is going to wind up to-day, raised this point last August, the noble Viscount said he was in correspondence with the noble Baroness, Lady Masham of Ilion. I wonder whether he has any news to show that the Government are not so hardhearted after all.

I should like now to deal briefly with two other arguments of the noble Viscount. First of all, he talked about concerts. This argument is often put forward by supporters of this scheme, but I never think it is a valid one. Of all the three arts, literature can be reproduced and has been able to be reproduced cheaply ever since the invention of printing. Music can be reproduced very well now, with modern inventions, and played in the home. But for the plastic arts there is really no substitute, and although colour printing has advanced very considerably in this century there is absolutely no substitute for the original. Furthermore, the State does not, for the most part, own the concert halls. I think this is quite a different matter. There is also the question of special exhibitions. This argument is often put forward, and here again I think different conditions apply. I personally, and most of the people who are opposed to these charges, have no objection to charges for special exhibitions. They have to be put on and they usually have to be self-financing. They are there only for a short time, and people arc often prepared to go to see them and pay a reasonable amount, because they know that they will not have a chance again. That is quite a different matter from the way that museums and galleries should be treated, which people like to visit often for a short time, to derive inspiration from looking at a few works of art, and then to go away refreshed.

This may be the last year when our national museums and galleries will be free. We on this side of the House have made our views on these charges very plain during two previous debates. There was one debate initiated by the noble Lord, Lord Annan, in December, and one on an Unstarred Question by my noble friend Lady Lee of Asheridge, in May. I know of no other proposal that has aroused so much hostility. People in the art world are almost unanimous in their condemnation, and I find that opposition to admittance charges is irrespective of Party. Indeed, I find that many of the strongest opponents outside this House are Conservatives. How can the Government and the Minister remain so obstinate? What an epitaph they are earning for themselves: the Government that caused turnstiles to be installed at the entrance to the British Museum, and made people pay to see Magna Carta! I hope that this whole disgraceful policy will be changed by the next Labour Government.