Tax relief no ‘game changer’
The spring budget’s proposals to help museums have been welcomed as ‘nice to have’, but do not change the overall picture of an ongoing funding crisis
The planned tax relief for temporary and touring exhibitions, and the extension of eligibility of VAT refunds for museums, announced in March’s budget, have been described as “nice to have” but not game-changing.
The two proposals were the main financial incentives aimed specifically at the museum sector, aside from the one-off pots of money for individual museums, in George Osborne’s latest budget, which also outlined additional cuts to local authority budgets.
A consultation on tax relief for temporary and touring exhibitions will launch this summer, with a view to implement it by April 2017.
Alistair Brown, the policy officer at the Museums Association, which has been pushing for this measure for some time, welcomes the proposal but says it remains to be seen what will be covered.
“It should be a real benefit to anyone putting on a temporary or touring exhibition,” says Brown. “It should mean hundreds, or maybe thousands, of pounds for museums trying to do new or innovative things.”
It is also hoped that tax relief for touring exhibitions will help to better serve more rural communities. Steve Miller, the head of Norfolk Museums Service, which oversees 10 museums, hopes the tax relief will be an incentive for museums to work more closely with the creative industries.
“I would like to see the sector doing more collaborative touring exhibitions and getting them out to the more rural areas, which is a big proportion of our community,” he says.
The extension of the museum VAT refund scheme, (previously available only to national and university museums and galleries) to include any museum or gallery that offers free entry without prior appointment and open to the public for at least 30 hours a week, was initially seen as a boost for free-entry museums.
Brown warns, however, that this measure is “almost meaningless” for local authority venues because the authorities already have a VAT exemption.
“For those museums that are free and have already moved to trust status, this will be a benefit, although it will not provide huge amounts of money,” says Brown. “On its own, it is not a reason to become a trust museum. It is not as big a gift as it might have once looked.”
These new financial measures are “nice-to-haves”, says Brown, and while the individual pots of money are all welcome, nothing changes the overall picture.
“Museum funding is in crisis across the country, so I would hesitate to call any of it game-changing,” he says.
Meanwhile, the confirmation of plans for a £20m Great Exhibition of the North in summer 2018 have been welcomed. But Alex Bird, the sector development officer at Museums Development North West, is concerned that the 30 June deadline for submissions is too soon, particularly as the competition document was only published on 5 April.
Tight deadline
“The £20m budget is realistic, but the timeline is so short that the kinds of venues who could meet it will already have plans in place for the next two years,” he says.
Bird welcomes the opportunity for satellite venues in smaller towns to get on board, but feels the aims of the exhibition and who it is targeting are unclear.
“Is it about a sense of place for northerners? Bringing southerners up north? Attracting overseas visitors and investment? The north is a big place and there is a lot of culture here, so I am not quite sure what it is going to look like.”
The two proposals were the main financial incentives aimed specifically at the museum sector, aside from the one-off pots of money for individual museums, in George Osborne’s latest budget, which also outlined additional cuts to local authority budgets.
A consultation on tax relief for temporary and touring exhibitions will launch this summer, with a view to implement it by April 2017.
Alistair Brown, the policy officer at the Museums Association, which has been pushing for this measure for some time, welcomes the proposal but says it remains to be seen what will be covered.
“It should be a real benefit to anyone putting on a temporary or touring exhibition,” says Brown. “It should mean hundreds, or maybe thousands, of pounds for museums trying to do new or innovative things.”
It is also hoped that tax relief for touring exhibitions will help to better serve more rural communities. Steve Miller, the head of Norfolk Museums Service, which oversees 10 museums, hopes the tax relief will be an incentive for museums to work more closely with the creative industries.
“I would like to see the sector doing more collaborative touring exhibitions and getting them out to the more rural areas, which is a big proportion of our community,” he says.
The extension of the museum VAT refund scheme, (previously available only to national and university museums and galleries) to include any museum or gallery that offers free entry without prior appointment and open to the public for at least 30 hours a week, was initially seen as a boost for free-entry museums.
Brown warns, however, that this measure is “almost meaningless” for local authority venues because the authorities already have a VAT exemption.
“For those museums that are free and have already moved to trust status, this will be a benefit, although it will not provide huge amounts of money,” says Brown. “On its own, it is not a reason to become a trust museum. It is not as big a gift as it might have once looked.”
These new financial measures are “nice-to-haves”, says Brown, and while the individual pots of money are all welcome, nothing changes the overall picture.
“Museum funding is in crisis across the country, so I would hesitate to call any of it game-changing,” he says.
Meanwhile, the confirmation of plans for a £20m Great Exhibition of the North in summer 2018 have been welcomed. But Alex Bird, the sector development officer at Museums Development North West, is concerned that the 30 June deadline for submissions is too soon, particularly as the competition document was only published on 5 April.
Tight deadline
“The £20m budget is realistic, but the timeline is so short that the kinds of venues who could meet it will already have plans in place for the next two years,” he says.
Bird welcomes the opportunity for satellite venues in smaller towns to get on board, but feels the aims of the exhibition and who it is targeting are unclear.
“Is it about a sense of place for northerners? Bringing southerners up north? Attracting overseas visitors and investment? The north is a big place and there is a lot of culture here, so I am not quite sure what it is going to look like.”