Regional Museums (Hansard, 5 November 2002)

§ Lord Sheldon
asked Her Majesty's Government:
What proposals they have to meet their commitment to revitalise regional museums.

§ The Minister of State, Department for Culture, Media and Sport (Baroness Blackstone)
My Lords, we shall be providing a total of £70 million for regional museums from this year until 2005–06. The funds are to be used to modernise and improve the quality of regional museums services.
Extra funding will also be available to the national museums to enable them to work in partnership with the regional museums and there will be funds from the Department for Education and Skills to support regional museums' education.
We have asked Resource, the Council for Museums, Archives and Libraries, to work with regional museums to determine how funds are to be distributed across the country.

§ Lord Sheldon
My Lords, I thank my noble friend for that reply. However, does she accept that the report, Renaissance in the Regions, produced by the committee chaired by my noble friend Lord Evans of Temple Guiting, set out in some detail the way in which moneys should be made available to our museums in the regions? At present museums are closing, some of the buildings are decaying and there is a decline in the morale of many of the people who work in them. Centres are needed in each region to act as a hub to obtain the assistance that many of these smaller museums require. Will my noble friend undertake to ensure that more funds are made available to enable them to continue to contribute to cultural life in the regions of this country?

§ Baroness Blackstone
My Lords, I am most grateful to my noble friend Lord Sheldon for the work that he has already done as a member of the committee, chaired by my noble friend Lord Evans of Temple Guiting, that produced the report, Renaissance in the Regions. It is an excellent report and the Government have endorsed many of its findings. For the first time funding has been made available from central government for these museums to enable a significant start to be made to the programme set out in the report and to develop its recommendations. It is, of course, for local authorities and, in some cases, universities, to provide the core funding for those institutions.

§ Lord Baker of Dorking
My Lords, is the Minister aware that the rhetoric of the Government on museums is to increase attendance and have longer opening hours? However, museums all over the country are finding it impossible to maintain their collections and out of the question to add to them. In order to save costs, they have to cut staff and close for hours, and sometimes days, a week. This week galleries 561 will be closed in the National Gallery and the British Museum. When will the Government's performance match their rhetoric?

§ Baroness Blackstone
My Lords, I do not think that the government of whom the noble Lord, Lord Baker, was a member had a terribly good reputation in respect of support for museums. For some years the funding available to our national museums and galleries was at a standstill. This Government have increased funding to those museums by 17 per cent in real terms. I repeat what I said in answer to the supplementary question of my noble friend Lord Sheldon. It is for local authorities around the country to support their regional and local museums. The Government are providing additional funds to help to ensure that those museums are able to improve the quality of the services that are available to them. As regards the closure of galleries at the British Museum, the Government are making available to the British Museum an extra £400,000 in the first year of this spending round to keep all of its galleries open.

§ Viscount Falkland
My Lords, has the noble Baroness seen the leader in The Times today that specifically mentions regional museums and urges creative thinking? What does she construe from that urging? If she agrees with it, what direction does she believe the creative thinking should take?

§ Baroness Blackstone
My Lords, I have seen the leader in today's edition of The Times. It is for the regional museums themselves and, indeed, Resource—the government body that works to provide facilities, advice and funding to the regional museums—to collaborate more effectively through the system of hubs that my noble friend Lord Sheldon mentioned. It is also the Government's policy to encourage the national museums and galleries to work much more effectively than has been the case in the past, sharing collections, curatorial skills and expertise with the regional museums.

§ Lord Faulkner of Worcester
My Lords, does my noble friend agree that one way to revitalise regional museums is to ensure that people know where they are and can find them? Is she aware that the Highways Agency is still dragging its feet over the provision of brown tourism signs on the M4 to the excellent steam railway museum in Swindon which is part of the potential Great Western Railway world heritage site and attracts 150,000 visitors a year? Will my noble friend please encourage the Highways Agency to install signs on Junctions 15 and 16 without further delay?

§ Baroness Blackstone
My Lords, I shall see whether the signs can he put up tomorrow. My noble friend is absolutely right; there should be good signage to all of our regional museums to enable people who wish to visit them to find them. It is, of course, the responsibility of the Department for Transport and the Highways Agency to install signs on our major 562 roads. They have been engaged in a consultation process and museums and galleries have been among the many consultees and have made their views known.

§ Baroness Finlay of Llandaff
My Lords, will the Minister please inform the House whether consideration has been given to providing a national portrait gallery for Wales given the excellent portrait painters in Wales and the lack of a focus for the regional heritage there?

§ Baroness Blackstone
My Lords, the national museums and galleries of Wales are a matter for the devolved administration. Therefore, I cannot answer that question.