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

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what steps he is taking to encourage more people to visit museums.

The world-class collections in our museums help people understand and participate in our culture and heritage, improve wellbeing, and provide learning, education and research. Museums are supported by public funding worth over £800 million annually to support this access. The UK Government remains committed to free entry to the permanent collections of our 15 DCMS- sponsored national museums ,which in total received around 47 million visits in 2017/18 .Additional projects, through Arts Council England (ACE), aim to improve cultural participation for everyone, regardless of their background. For example, ACE funds Creative People and Places which supports participation in places with traditionally lower engagement with culture. The scheme has just announced 79 new places will be eligible to apply for £24 million of funding in 2019 and 2020, to fund projects until 2023/4.