A decision on whether to cut Bristol Museum’s funding by £436,000 over the next six years has been pushed back until March after the city council failed to agree a new budget.
Council members met on 15 February on its proposed budget for 2022-23, which included reducing its museums, galleries and archives services’ £3.5m budget by 10%. The council’s public report pack shows plans to reduce funding by £83,000 a year starting in 2023-24, rising to £353,000 the following year and hitting £436,000 by 2027.
But a decision on whether to accept this budget, or a number of alternatives proposed by opposition groups, has been postponed until its meeting on 2 March.
Ahead of Tuesday’s meeting, the Friends of Bristol Museums, Galleries and Archives said the proposed cuts would damage the city’s post-pandemic recovery and “dramatically reduce” cultural services’ ability to function.
Sue Thurlow, the chair of the Friends group, said: “We fully understand the need to make budget savings at a time when many of our citizens are facing real financial hardship, and that councillors are facing really difficult choices in allocating scarce resources, but cuts to museums and galleries are a false economy which will affect the range and quality of services they can offer.
“The council must reconsider these planned cuts because the damage caused to the museums and archives will be felt across the city and beyond for years to come.”
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In a letter to the council dated 14 February, the Bristol branch of Unison union warned that the cuts would “decimate” staffing.
It also queried the equalities impact assessment as “wrong and out of date” as they originally suggested the budget would be reduced by £85,000 whereas the true figure is more than £420,000.
“[Museums and archives remain] the last free event that a low waged family can undertake on a rainy day,” it said in its letter. “With the cost of living increases and the low wage economy this is essential to many of your citizens.”
A spokesperson for Bristol City Council said: “The cabinet has proposed a balanced budget that means we can avoid cuts to crucial frontline services.
“Savings need to be made to the culture service in line with other savings being made by other departments. There is currently a review of the culture service and no final decisions have been made.”
This makes me very angry! Where would the City be without M Shed rescuing Colston’s statue and playing a very significant role in the BLM debate in Bristol? It’s the usual double standards from the City Councillors – they want their cake but don’t want to pay for it. They can’t recognise VFM after continued budget cuts over many years, dating back from when I was Director, and refuse to understand that you can’t have a cultural service worthy of the City without professional staff!