Sharon Heal: editorial
Sharon Heal, Issue 111/11, p4, 01.11.2011
Cuts are putting free admission at risk
Next month marks the 10th anniversary of the introduction of free admission for national museums in England (Scotland and Wales celebrated their anniversaries earlier this year).
It’s a cause for applause when you consider that those organisations that formerly charged have increased their visitors by more than 150% on average in the intervening period.
There is no room for complacency, however; the Conservatives have long been rumoured to be in favour of charging and, despite all their protest to the contrary, would probably love the London nationals to be able to levy high admission charges on their millions of visitors.
Continued free entry is a cause worth supporting, but the 10-year celebrations might be muted when the UK-wide picture is taken into account.
In Scotland, for example, where national museums have been hard hit by funding reductions, there has been serious talk of reintroducing charges.
Earlier this year, National Museums Scotland was forced to introduce charges for five to 12-year-olds at three of its sites – a move it attributed directly to the budget cuts.
Elsewhere around the UK, local authority museums have suffered far more brutal cuts than the national institutions, and many have felt that they have had no choice but to introduce charges.
The impact where this has happened has been swift and drastic – falls in visitor numbers of between a third and a half have been recorded.
However, it’s not just about the numbers that come through the door. The real effect of charging will be felt in terms of who visits a museum, and the position the museum itself holds in the local community.
So yes, let’s celebrate free admission but let’s also highlight the effect cuts are having on museums throughout the UK.
Sharon Heal, editor, Museums Journal
sharon@museumsassociation.org
www.twitter.com/sharonheal
www.museumsassociation.org/cuts
It’s a cause for applause when you consider that those organisations that formerly charged have increased their visitors by more than 150% on average in the intervening period.
There is no room for complacency, however; the Conservatives have long been rumoured to be in favour of charging and, despite all their protest to the contrary, would probably love the London nationals to be able to levy high admission charges on their millions of visitors.
Continued free entry is a cause worth supporting, but the 10-year celebrations might be muted when the UK-wide picture is taken into account.
In Scotland, for example, where national museums have been hard hit by funding reductions, there has been serious talk of reintroducing charges.
Earlier this year, National Museums Scotland was forced to introduce charges for five to 12-year-olds at three of its sites – a move it attributed directly to the budget cuts.
Elsewhere around the UK, local authority museums have suffered far more brutal cuts than the national institutions, and many have felt that they have had no choice but to introduce charges.
The impact where this has happened has been swift and drastic – falls in visitor numbers of between a third and a half have been recorded.
However, it’s not just about the numbers that come through the door. The real effect of charging will be felt in terms of who visits a museum, and the position the museum itself holds in the local community.
So yes, let’s celebrate free admission but let’s also highlight the effect cuts are having on museums throughout the UK.
Sharon Heal, editor, Museums Journal
sharon@museumsassociation.org
www.twitter.com/sharonheal
www.museumsassociation.org/cuts
Add your comment
The question the sector needs to ask itself is what am I for (or even, what am allowed to be for)? It seems the previous decade of being about education, access and enjoyment are drawing to a close, and we are now entering the tourism and experience markets at a pace that are taking us all by suprise (well many of us). Museums are now not only having to pay their own way, but are having to compete in a flooded visitor attraction market. Museums are losing education and outreach staff at a fast pace, and instead are reverting to employing 'Heads of Development' and 'Visitor Experience Managers' or the ominous, 'Commercial Manager'. If the sector is having to change, then so too should the guarded nationals. If they can't adapt and move with the rest of the sector, then we will only see greater polarisation of the sector from the centrally funded few to the squabbling rabble of the masses. I would much rather see museums looking inward at themselves and asking the challenging questions of 'who am I for' and 'how can I and my collection survive'. Those true community museums will have nothing to fear from asking, and will likely remain as-is, but those that have struggled to engage and integrate their local community into their museum will likely find that their core audience is the visitor with a few pounds in their pocket to spend on their cultural experience, and probably not at the cost of their remit or audience base...
The number of small, often privately owned, museums that proliferated in recent years ahs weakened the position of the core, by diverting funding and audiences. Perhaps this is not undesirable, but it has certainly not helped the provincial local government museums that have provided the spine to the skeleton of British museums for so long.
There should be a serious and concerted effort to support and improve the colections held by local government museums, but the introduction of charges will weaken visitor numbers and drive closures and sales.
This latter has not been helped by the woolly-minded thinking of the MA's own ethics committee which has opened the door to disposals for financial reasons.
Local authority museums are at greater risk than for generations, perhaps ever. The focus should be on these collections and the staff that curate them (and I mean curate, not all the other stuff which ahs crept in over a few decades). Lose them, and we will all - nationals, trusts, small private museums and all - be much poorer.
So people shouldn't call for the removal of free admission because they have chosen a specific style of museum offer. Instead, they should ask themselves whether their own choices have contributing to undermining the whole edifice.
Ducks below parapet.....
I can’t remember the statistic but I think the average donation at the BM is less than 25p per visitor. I think that about sums up the situation. Most local authority museums (mine included) bring home an average donation many multiples of that – but then I guess necessity is the mother of invention.
Oh and just thinking about the amazing subsidised BM canteen makes me so jealous, especially when I compare it to our staffroom/stationary cupboard.