§ Lord Morris of Manchesterasked Her Majesty's Government:
What help they have given, or will be giving, to the United Kingdom National Inventory of War Memorials in support of its three-year project to record the names on every memorial, so as to make it possible to trace a war cemetery abroad from a name on a local war memorial and to discover the action in which the service man or woman died. [HL1377]
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Defence (Lord Bach)The Government recognise the great value of the work of the United Kingdom National Inventory of War Memorials in raising public awareness and appreciation of the nation's war memorials and monitoring their condition. The new project will be a major enhancement of that work and we wish it every success.
It has, however, been a long-standing policy of successive governments that war memorials are not funded by public money but by private donations or subscriptions. This policy extends to the work of the national inventory. The organisation understands the policy and has recently launched a public appeal to raise the £2.2 million which is required.