Museums and Galleries

(asked on 13th January 2016) - View Source

Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, how much his Department spent on museums and galleries in (a) 2005, (b) 2010 and (c) 2014-15; and what estimate he has made of such spending in (i) 2015-16 and (ii) 2016-17.


Answered by
Lord Vaizey of Didcot Portrait
Lord Vaizey of Didcot
This question was answered on 29th January 2016

Thanks to an excellent Spending Review settlement in November 2015 - the Government is honouring its manifesto commitment to keep entry to the permanent collections of our national museums free.


Through the Arts Council England, DCMS is increasing funding for major partner museums to £22.6 million to enable greater regional spending. In addition to this, regional museums can bid for funds from ACE's £10 million per year Resilience Fund. We are also investing millions of pounds to boost local and regional museums - for example, £5 million towards a new South Asia Gallery at Manchester Museum and £2.5 million to the Manchester Museum of Science andIndustry.


Spend on DCMS-sponsored museums and galleries was £389.7 million in 2014/15. In 2005 spend was £397.4 million and in 2010 it was £474.7 million. The Heritage Lottery Fund is also a major source of support to museums. To date, HLF has supported a total of 38,000 projects with £6.6 billion across the UK with around one third of this being allocated to museums, including support for capital projects, acquisitions and skills development.

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