Edmund Southworth is the county museums officer at the Lancashire County Museums Service
No: Lancashire covers 2,903 sq km and has a population of more than a million. It's incredibly diverse and a 'one size fits all' approach doesn't work. Some of our 12 museum sites open seven days but some of them don't. We know we have different audiences at different sites at different times of the year. As we get better at understanding our audiences through our surveys we get better at tailoring our service to them.
Our funds are limited and fixed. Take the Museum of Lancashire in Preston. It currently opens five out of seven days, on Saturday but not Sunday. As part of local government we pay staff more at weekends so to pay for Sunday would mean closing correspondingly more during the week.
But 40 per cent of our users at this site are school groups coming during the week. Families also use us more during the week in holidays. The Museum of Lancashire is in a very secondary retail/light industrial zone that is more or less closed at the weekend. Preston hasn't developed a Sunday economy and it isn't a Sunday leisure destination.
Where the visitor demand merits, we operate seven days with a pool of casual and part-time workers but it needs highly skilled staff to demonstrate machines at our textile museums in East Lancashire. We open one on Sundays but the cost of staffing the other for a handful of visitors is totally prohibitive.
Vanessa Trevelyan is the head of the Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service (NMAS)
Yes: Museums exist to provide a service to the public and should be open at times that suit the public. What the public wants will vary according to the museum and local preferences.
In Norwich, weekends are a popular time for families to spend quality time together and museums should be available. Sunday is a busy day for many different kinds of leisure activities including shopping, sports and museums. It is not acceptable to consider physical, intellectual and emotional access, while not also taking into account time access.
In Norfolk we consider that the weekends and public holidays should be considered normal working days. This is reflected in front-of-house staff terms and conditions of service so that they receive the same hourly rate for weekend working as they do for weekdays. This hourly rate was enhanced when overtime payments were removed so that, on average, staff receive similar remuneration.
But this availability should be backed up by a sound business case. We find that Sunday mornings tend not to be very busy and it does not make business sense to employ staff if the demand is not there. This is despite the accusation by an irate German visitor that Norwich Castle was the only museum in Europe that did not open on Sunday mornings.
Many museums are seasonal - I wouldn't expect them to open on a Sunday when they are otherwise closed for seasonal reasons.
No: Lancashire covers 2,903 sq km and has a population of more than a million. It's incredibly diverse and a 'one size fits all' approach doesn't work. Some of our 12 museum sites open seven days but some of them don't. We know we have different audiences at different sites at different times of the year. As we get better at understanding our audiences through our surveys we get better at tailoring our service to them.
Our funds are limited and fixed. Take the Museum of Lancashire in Preston. It currently opens five out of seven days, on Saturday but not Sunday. As part of local government we pay staff more at weekends so to pay for Sunday would mean closing correspondingly more during the week.
But 40 per cent of our users at this site are school groups coming during the week. Families also use us more during the week in holidays. The Museum of Lancashire is in a very secondary retail/light industrial zone that is more or less closed at the weekend. Preston hasn't developed a Sunday economy and it isn't a Sunday leisure destination.
Where the visitor demand merits, we operate seven days with a pool of casual and part-time workers but it needs highly skilled staff to demonstrate machines at our textile museums in East Lancashire. We open one on Sundays but the cost of staffing the other for a handful of visitors is totally prohibitive.
Vanessa Trevelyan is the head of the Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service (NMAS)
Yes: Museums exist to provide a service to the public and should be open at times that suit the public. What the public wants will vary according to the museum and local preferences.
In Norwich, weekends are a popular time for families to spend quality time together and museums should be available. Sunday is a busy day for many different kinds of leisure activities including shopping, sports and museums. It is not acceptable to consider physical, intellectual and emotional access, while not also taking into account time access.
In Norfolk we consider that the weekends and public holidays should be considered normal working days. This is reflected in front-of-house staff terms and conditions of service so that they receive the same hourly rate for weekend working as they do for weekdays. This hourly rate was enhanced when overtime payments were removed so that, on average, staff receive similar remuneration.
But this availability should be backed up by a sound business case. We find that Sunday mornings tend not to be very busy and it does not make business sense to employ staff if the demand is not there. This is despite the accusation by an irate German visitor that Norwich Castle was the only museum in Europe that did not open on Sunday mornings.
Many museums are seasonal - I wouldn't expect them to open on a Sunday when they are otherwise closed for seasonal reasons.
