Overseas visitor fees, a new NPO model and a ‘long-term plan’ for museums: Our breakdown of the ACE review

Arts Council England (ACE) should abandon its 10-year strategy, overhaul National Portfolio funding and come up with a “specific long-term plan” for museums, according to Labour peer Margaret Hodge’s independent review of the arm’s-length body, which published its findings this week.

Written following a year-long sector consultation, the review makes several recommendations that could have far-reaching implications for museums in England if taken forward by the government.

These include a call to scrap the arts council's 2020-30 strategy, Let’s Create, in favour of a “new, less prescriptive strategy”, and a recommendation for a “completely new model” for National Portfolio Organisation (NPO) funding.

Hodge also said the UK Government should consider introducing admission charges for overseas visitors to national museums and galleries.

Other recommendations include a ring-fenced tourist tax to support culture, and stronger incentives for philanthropy, such as a call to double Gift Aid outside London and the south-east.

Museum and heritage findings

Despite positive feedback from the sector about the arts council’s specific support for museums and its “highly praised” museum team, Hodge found that “museums do not feel sufficiently represented and considered by the arts council beyond the dedicated team, particularly at board level”.

The review said that, while ACE has worked to raise the profile of museums within the arts and culture ecology, “further efforts are still needed to ensure these institutions are not perceived as less important than the performing and visual arts” in the arts council’s strategic priorities or funding decisions.

There were also criticisms of the arts council’s role as a development agency for the sector, with specific concerns raised about the arts council’s reporting system, Illuminate, which “does not fit well with how museums operate”.

Hodge said that while ACE should retain its role as the development agency for museums, this role should be strengthened and there was a “strong desire for ACE to create and own a strategy for museums that would clarify its role and define its aims”.

The review heard that museum schemes managed by the arts council, such as Accreditation, Acceptance in Lieu and the Cultural Gifts Scheme, are “effectively run”.

However concerns were raised about the Government Indemnity Scheme (GIS), which provides cultural institutions with an alternative to commercial insurance.

The review found that “since the global pandemic, the approach to risk has tightened up to such an extent that [GIS] is less effective in delivering its goals”.

“Fewer works are being shown in museums and galleries around the country,” continued the review, with one individual describing the situation as a “ticking time bomb” as items are reevaluated due to the tightening of rules.

The review recommended that ACE should take a “more proactive role” in raising awareness of the Acceptance in Lieu, Cultural Gifts Scheme and the Government Indemnity Scheme.

Hodge advised the arts council to “adopt a more pragmatic approach to risk appetite in relation to the Government Indemnity Scheme”, and said this should be supported by the government.

Beyond the arts council, the review called on the government to consider bringing in admission charges for international visitors to national museums and galleries.

The review said the government’s recently announced introduction of ID cards “would present a valuable opportunity to revisit the policy of free entry for international visitors to national museums and galleries”.

The review also highlighted the sharp rise in insurance costs for listed cultural buildings, with some experiencing 200% increases.

“The government should examine the levers at its disposal to help these organisations, ensuring that heritage-listed cultural buildings can be preserved for future generations,” the review said.

Wider recommendations

Beyond the museum sector, the Hodge review was more critical of the arts council’s role in supporting the wider cultural ecology, calling for a “radical overhaul” of its strategy and funding models.

The review said the arts council’s 10-year strategy, Let’s Create, pursued culture in an instrumentalist way that deprioritised “artistic excellence” and “stifled creativity and innovation”, leading to widespread frustration across the sector.

There was also “almost universal criticism” of the arts council’s application processes and the reporting demands, the review found.

Hodge urged ACE to “replace Let’s Create with a new, less prescriptive strategy that is both ambitious, simple and reflects the government’s ambition of excellence for all”.

The review found that the current NPO system was not working, with feedback highlighting the system’s lack of sensitivity to differences in size and artform among applicants, “burdensome bureaucracy”, and a lack of communication and transparency around funding decisions.

It recommended a “completely new model for funding the National Portfolio Organisations”, and said ACE should “radically reform its application and reporting requirements so that they are less bureaucratic and onerous for organisations but still ensure accountability for public money”.

Outside of the arts council, the review made several recommendations to the government on tackling the culture funding crisis.

These include a statutory duty for local government to prepare a cultural strategy every five years, tourist levies ringfenced for cultural infrastructure, and new measures to support philanthropic giving, including doubling the level of Gift Aid from £0.25 to £0.50 for cultural services that reach audiences outside London and the south-east.

Politicisation

The review also highlighted “political interference” in the arts council, and said the arm’s length principle should be strengthened and maintained.

“There have been attempts to exert more political control over ACE decisions in recent years and this has to stop,” it said.

“The arts council must remain free from political interference. This matters. It ensures that artistic freedom is protected, that creativity is not stifled and that public trust is maintained. Political interference, even by those with the best of intentions, could lead to political bias, or even censorship.”

ACE response

The arts council said it welcomed the review and was “heartened to read of the ‘overwhelming’ backing for the principles – of excellence and access – that underpin our strategy, Let’s Create”.

ACE said it was “encouraged and energised by the review’s recommendations to go further in our support for artists, to search for new sources of funding for the arts”.

The arts council added that it had “heard clearly that we have been too ‘prescriptive’ in how we implement Let’s Create”.

“We recognise that we must give our artists and organisations more space to articulate their ambition, and that we need to reduce the administrative burden we have placed on them. We have already begun to simplify our application and monitoring processes, but we know that we must do more, more quickly, to ensure that all our processes are smoother, faster, and easier to use.”

ACE chief executive Darren Henley said: “We want people to spend less time on our paperwork and more time on their creative work. Our mission over the months to come is to roll up our sleeves and make that happen.”

Culture sector reaction

There has been cautious support for the review in the museum and wider culture sectors, particularly its call for a strategic framework and long-term plan for museums.

Sharon Heal, the director of the Museums Association (MA), said: “We welcome the publication of the independent review of Arts Council England.

“We have long argued for a meaningful strategy for museums in England, so we particularly support the recommendation to develop a strategic framework and create a specific long-term plan for museums. We would like to see this recommendation taken forward in full engagement with the museum sector and community partners to ensure these plans are relevant and more importantly fully funded.

“There will be nervousness about changes to the NPO system and early clarification and reassurance about what this means for museums is needed.

“Going forward we will work with our members and sector partners to understand the potential impacts of the recommendations, and we look forward to reading the government’s response in the new year.”

The National Museum Directors' Council (NMDC) said: “We are grateful to Baroness Hodge for consulting so widely across the museums sector and are encouraged to see that many of the issues raised by NMDC and our members are reflected in the review – including the need to strengthen ACE’s role as development agency for museums, and positive feedback on the ACE Museums team.

"We look forward to seeing the government’s response and to working with DCMS and ACE to take forward the review’s recommendations.”

Steve Thomas, the deputy general secretary at Prospect trade union, said: “Prospect particularly welcomes the review’s acknowledgement of the role of museums, and clear recommendation of the creation of a specific plan for museums within Arts Council England.

“This plan must include an acknowledgement of the challenges facing heritage workers, where low pay, high workloads and insecurity are often the result of the funding framework.”

Writing on LinkedIn, Tony Butler, the chief executive of Derby Museums Trust, said the review had “a lot of sensible proposals”, such as its recommendations to champion the arm's-length principle while recognising the political reality of devolution, and to strengthen emphasis on artform or sector. Butler also welcomed the call to develop a “museum strategy for England (almost)”.

Museum consultant Timothy Ambrose said the fact that ACE had not yet developed a strategy for museums since it assumed responsibility for the sector in 2011 was “instructive”.

“It raises the fundamental question as to whether museums would be better served either by re-establishing a dedicated development agency for the sector (as Scotland had done so successfully) or by transferring responsibility and resource to a repurposed and restructured [the National Lottery Heritage Fund],” he said.

“Brigading museums with the contemporary arts sector rather than the heritage sector has always seemed something of a difficult fit. But the train may have left the platform on that point, and it will therefore be important for ACE to engage the whole museum sector in creating a new long-term strategy.”

However, the review was criticised by fundraising and business adviser Andrew Evans, who said it “completely ignored the fact that in 2009 ACE had £580m of funding and in 2025 it has £460m. If this had kept pace with inflation ACE would have £920m”.

“So whatever the review suggests (and I’m sure lots of it will be very sensible) perhaps there’s a simpler answer to why people don’t have great access to high quality arts?” he added.

Bridget McKenzie, the founder of the Climate Museum, criticised the review’s stance on sponsorship, saying there was a “significant problematic element in the [review’s] section about tackling the funding crisis”.

The Hodge review said that “boycotting sponsors of the arts and culture will often be more damaging to the arts than to the sponsor” and recommended that “ACE has a leadership role to play in setting the parameters of what is and is not acceptable behaviour”.

Responding to this part of the review, McKenzie said: “There’s no mention of how unethical and manipulative sponsorships cause harm to the cultural sector (including its audiences, communities, and the stressed planet we depend upon).

“There is only the emphasis on the point that refusing or boycotting sponsors can cause more harm. This is ill-evidenced, sweeping, and goes against current majority opinion by cultural workers & audiences.”

She said the arts council should instead be called on to “provide moral and practical clarity on appropriate terms of sponsorship deals, for example, not allowing sponsors too much influence and allowing artists to speak out without censure”.

Government response

The culture secretary Lisa Nandy said she “strongly welcomes” the review.

“This review highlights the strengths of Arts Council England’s work, but it also challenges us to do better,” she said.

“It sets out recommendations to strengthen support for artists, reach communities more effectively, and ensure that creativity is accessible to all. The government will now consider these recommendations.”

The government’s and arts council’s full responses to the review will be published in the new year.

An in-depth analysis of the review and its implications for museums will be published in Museums Journal in due course