§ Mr. Waldenasked the Chancellor of the Exchequer whether he is aware of the desirability of acquiring important works of art from the estate of the late Captain E. G. Spencer-Churchill for the national and provincial museums and galleries; and whether he will take action in this regard.
§ Mr. MacDermotCaptain Spencer-Churchill's will provides for certain categories of objects from his collection to be offered at a valuation to the British and the Ashmolean Museums. In addition, the executors have offered certain selected works of art to the Inland Revenue in part satisfaction of Estate Duty under Section 34 of the 1956 Finance Act and we are discussing this offer with them. The standard for acceptance under this provision is, of course, high and acceptance necessarily depends also on agreement on price.
It is also open to both the national collections and to other public museums and galleries to approach the executors with a view to making purchases. It would, of course, be for the executors to say whether they felt able to negotiate for sale in any particular case, but the provisions of Section 40(2) of the Finance Act, 1930, should be of very considerable assistance to any public collection making such an approach. On a sale to a private purchaser, or on a sale at auction, the exemption from Estate Duty attaching to important works of art under Section 40(1) of the 1930 Act is lost, but on a private treaty sale to a public collection or Government Department, the exemption continues. In such cases, the Government regards it as a fair arrangement that the price offered should divide the benefit of the exemption—which is very large where the rate of duty is high—as to three-quarters to the Exchequer and one-quarter to the executors. This arrangement is advantageous to both parties and acts as an encouragement to the sale of works of art by private treaty to the national collections. It is open to any public collection covered by Section 40(2) of the Finance Act, 1930, to take 292W advantage of the Exchequer subsidy on sales by executors to such collections which the exemption represents—making it more profitable, in the extreme case, to sell at 21 per cent. of market value to a public collection then to sell at full value at auction—and I would like to draw the attention of those concerned to this opportunity, both in relation to my hon. Friend's Question and more generally.
Finally, it is open to provincial museums and galleries to make application for assistance with approved purchases to the Victoria and Albert Museum or to the Royal Scottish Museum, which administer funds for this purpose.