Museums and Galleries: Financial Sustainability Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateLord Dubs
Main Page: Lord Dubs (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Dubs's debates with the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport
(4 years, 10 months ago)
Lords ChamberThe Government do not have any plans to designate any other museums as national museums. Moves have been made to increase funding, particularly to regional museums, through Arts Council England; obviously, we are very keen for them to thrive. We have seen new museums open regionally, and important loans have majorly boosted visitor numbers. We are keen to see that continue.
My Lords, many other large cities have a hotel tax. One only has to go to New York to see that it is quite a large percentage of what one pays. What about having a hotel tax in some of our cities—particularly London, which is awash with tourists all the time—and using at least some of the proceeds as a contribution to our museums and galleries?
Again, the noble Lord makes an interesting suggestion. Our broader view is that we expect museums and galleries to continue to be funded by a mixture of public money, philanthropic money and other forms of fundraising.