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

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they will take steps to ensure that buyers of art and antiques, including from dealers and auction houses, receive information about the provenance of such objects, including documentation of previous owners.

The UK has made it a criminal offence to deal dishonestly in tainted cultural property and issued guidelines to help UK dealers and auction houses consider the relevant issues such as ensuring good provenance of cultural objects in which they deal.

However, the Government believes that regulating trade in art and antiquities is primarily the responsibility of the art and antiquities trade itself. The established trade associations possess codes of ethics by which they expect their members to abide and we expect the associations to enforce those codes strictly.