Hugh Robertson

I congratulate the hon. Member for Hendon (Mr. Dismore) on introducing the Bill and on his admirably brief speech. I do not think that I have ever heard him finish so quickly on a Friday—it has not happened in living memory. He is right to say at the outset that the holocaust was an event of such overriding horror, cruelty and depravity that, as my hon. Friend the Chairman of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee pointed out, parliamentarians on both sides of the House would support any form of restitution.

I declare a sort of interest on this issue. As many hon. Members will know, I served in the Army for just over a decade, from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s, and saw active service in four separate war zones. The issue of art looted from war zones and their periphery is therefore unfortunately familiar. I look back on my time in Sarajevo in the early 1990s and well remember the destruction of the fabulous old Ottoman library, and the looting of many priceless Islamic texts. We also saw the appearance of several valuable Serbian Orthodox icons, which had obviously been looted from Serbian churches, in the antique shops of the Muslim quarter of the city. Plunder and looting are as old as war itself, and it is right that we should do everything in our power to prevent it and, if we cannot, to restore objects to their rightful place when possible.

I am delighted to say that the Bill has my strong personal support and that of my party. However, I also strongly support the principle that cultural property residing in our national collections should be held by trustees at arm's length and for the public benefit, rather than being subject to the particular political whims of the day. Any alteration to that principle should be enacted only by Parliament in exceptional circumstances. In my view, the holocaust is such a circumstance.

Several issues would benefit from further exploration during the subsequent phases of this Bill. First, on the question of the time periods and the sunset clause in the Bill, is a fixed period of 10 years the most appropriate means of measurement, as opposed to a rolling period? The latter would allow a reasonable period after the inclusion of an object on the appropriate statutory list, whereas an absolute, fixed period could leave a claimant disadvantaged if, for example, an object appeared on the list toward the end of that fixed period.

It is also worth noting that in the nine years since the Secretary of State set up the Spoliation Advisory Panel, it has reported on only eight cases. Inevitably, as the time since the end of the second world war lengthens, it is unlikely that the number of applicants bringing cases to the panel will increase. The reasonable expectation must be that the numbers will decline. Museums—a number have contacted me in the past couple of days—have carried out considerable research into the Nazi-era provenance of their collections, which has been published online with the involvement of the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council. In many cases, museums feel that they have exhausted the reasonable efforts that can be expected of them within the confines of their budgets to establish the 1933 to 1945 provenance of their collections. For many museums, documentation to establish the ownership of objects whose provenance has not already been traced to that period simply no longer exists.

Secondly, the various Acts under which the boards of trustees of the national museums have been established range over a considerable period and give different powers to the boards of different museums. Clearly, further detailed examination of the interaction of each board's powers is necessary, which hopefully could happen in Committee.

Thirdly, as the hon. Member for Hendon set out in his speech and in the short title of the Bill, the measure applies only to the holocaust. Sadly, there were many atrocities before that time as there have been subsequently—in Bosnia, as I said, there was clearly considerable looting of works of art. Sad though each of those atrocities is, they should be dealt with individually, case by case. The Museums Association's code of ethics, which was updated two years ago, already covers claims on objects in other periods and sets out the agreed ethical codes and standards that allow museums to return items from their collections. The MLAC ensured that its accreditation scheme incorporates that code.

Fourthly, although the existing panel can offer swift, independent and transparent assessment of claims in a way that is cost-effective for all parties, its claims are, correctly, advisory only. The Bill should not undermine the arm's-length principle on which national museums and galleries are governed. Our national collections are vested in the boards of trustees of the various museums and galleries, and the decision whether to de-accession from those collections must reside with those trustees.

Finally, and in some ways least importantly, three small tax implications need to be considered. First, the Bill will need to decide the appropriate level of capital gains tax payable if an object is sold after being returned to its original owner. Furthermore, careful thought needs to be given as to whether any ex gratia payment is free of tax. Secondly, on inheritance tax, it would be harsh indeed if an object returned to a claimant subsequently had to be sold to pay death duties. Some form of exemption may be appropriate. Thirdly, donors to museums do not always know that their objects were stolen during the holocaust. In such cases, which need careful investigation, there should not be a tax penalty—in effect—for doing the right thing.

I should like to conclude by saying three things. First, to go back to where I began, I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on securing his place in the ballot and on introducing the Bill. Secondly, my party and I look forward to the Public Bill Committee, when we can examine in greater detail a number of the issues that we have outlined today. However, thirdly and most importantly, the Bill, particularly in view of the circumstances pertaining to the holocaust, ought to enjoy our full support.

— from debate entitled “Holocaust (Stolen Art) Restitution Bill”

The three speeches/headings immediately before

  1. 1 earlier: Andrew Dismore

    I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for those comments, and I am sorry for my oversight in overlooking his Committee's report. I am grateful for that report, for the earlier work of the Committee under its previous chairmanship and for what he and his Committee have had to say on the issue.

    As I was saying, Lord Janner took this issue up with the next culture Minister who dealt with the matter—I think that we are now on our third—my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking. In a letter of 18 December 2007, she said:

    "The Government is strongly persuaded by the moral argument for changing the law in this area and that seems to have been the overriding view from the consultation responses. I...have asked officials to look into options".

    In a hand-written note at the end, she said:

    "I will write to you again when I have identified a suitable slot and satisfied myself that we have an appropriate and properly constituted proposition. I hope you welcome this news".

    In another letter to Lord Janner of 30 May 2008, my right hon. Friend said:

    "I am happy to reassure you that a team of officials at DCMS are working on this issue and are making good progress...There are...a number of policy issues to determine".

    Again there was a hand-written note at the end, which said:

    "I am working hard to achieve progress in this area."

    In the meantime, in 2008, the panel heard a claim for two pieces of porcelain from a Viennese collection, one of which was in the Fitzwilliam museum and the other in the British Museum. The one in the Fitzwilliam museum was restituted, but the panel felt it could not recommend the restitution of the second piece because it said that there was no sign that the Government were going to change the law, so it awarded an ex gratia payment. Even the then Minister thought that the inconsistency was untenable, and issued a press statement saying that the law should be changed.

    In the summer of 2008, we got on to our fourth Minister—the Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, my hon. Friend the Member for Stevenage, who is in her place—and it looked as though the Government were going to resolve the issue in the anticipated heritage Bill. We were hoping that that would be in the Queen's Speech, but that did not happen. That is why I have introduced my Bill today, some four years after the issue first arose as a result of the High Court case, during which time we have been in limbo in respect of so many of these items, which, in each case, belong to somebody else and are stuck in our national collections.

    The best estimate is that about 20 certainly looted items are in UK museums, but there could be more. The process of research by families is ongoing and it can take quite a while to locate an item and document a claim, but of course not every rightful owner may want restitution. Some might, whereas others might settle for an ex gratia compensation payment or might simply want a public acknowledgement of the rightful ownership by the gallery or museum concerned. But it should be for the rightful owners to decide the fate of the object, not the institution concerned, once ownership has been decided to the satisfaction of the Spoliation Advisory Panel and on its recommendation to the Minister.

    My Bill would provide a process, with appropriate safeguards, to achieve that outcome. It aims to work by agreement and by consensus. If there is a huge dispute, it would not work and the item would not be returned. The process is straightforward. The item claimed is referred to the panel. If the panel finds the object to be spoliated, it makes a recommendation for restitution to the Secretary of State, if it thinks that that is the proper remedy. If the Secretary of State accepts that restitution is appropriate, he or she can trigger a power—not a duty—of de-accession to the museum concerned.

    The Bill also contains safeguards. It does not override any special conditions or trust under which an object may be held. That would require complex legislation and I baulked at even attempting that because it would not be appropriate for a private Member's Bill. It is limited to a finite and definitive list of institutions, which are set out in clause 2. It also has a 10-year sunset clause to provide, on the one hand, sufficient time to facilitate claims and identify objects and, on the other, to provide some long-term certainty to the public collections concerned.

    Above all, the Bill is strictly limited as to time, place and perpetrator of the original deprivation of the object from its lawful owner. It is not a Trojan horse for the Parthenon sculptures—that is my next Bill—or for any other artworks or cultural items. It is a discreet, modest measure, limited in scope and time to rectify decades of injustice, and I commend it to the House.

  2. 2 earlier: John Whittingdale

    I am following the hon. Gentleman's timeline carefully, but I would not want him to overlook the fact that the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport examined this matter in June 2007. We endorsed the findings of the predecessor Committee and expressed our regret that the Government had not been able to fulfil their international obligations or previous commitments—I simply congratulate him on this Bill, which I hope will succeed in finally doing that.

  3. 3 earlier: Andrew Dismore

    I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

    The Bill's purpose is straightforward: it is to meet our moral, if not legal, obligations to provide a mechanism for the return to their rightful owners of cultural objects held in national collections that were looted during the Nazi period. I have taken a particular interest in the issue since first being elected, as I think is shown by the number of parliamentary questions I have tabled and meetings I have held with representatives of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. I have to say that the Government, and successive Arts Ministers, have been sympathetic throughout. I wish to compliment the Under-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, my hon. Friend the Member for Stevenage (Barbara Follett), on the support and assistance that she and her officials have given me so far.

    On 17 February 2000, in response to a parliamentary question from me, the then Arts Minister, now Lord Howarth, announced the setting up of the Spoliation Advisory Panel under the chairmanship of a former judge Sir David Hirst. He said the panel would consider and advise on claims from anyone who lost possession of a cultural object during the Nazi era where such an object was now in the possession of a UK national collection or gallery. Of course, there was still a lot of detail to work out, such as formulating and finalising the terms of reference and the membership, but the matter moved fairly quickly from that time.

    In April, the membership and terms of reference were announced, and in response to a further question from me Lord Howarth said:

    "The Government are determined to set an example of how a civilised society should conduct itself in making possible redress for historic wrongs committed during the Nazi era, including the looting of cultural objects."—[ Official Report, 8 May 2000; Vol. 349, c. 491.]

    In June 2000, in evidence to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, the British Museum agreed with the Committee Chair that if it held objects looted by the Nazis, it would wish to find a way to achieve the return of those objects to the victim's family.

    The first meeting of the panel took place on Thursday 8 June 2000. It was aware of only one claim at that stage, but it received some fame from it: Jan Griffier the Elder's picture, "A view of Hampton court palace", which the Tate had acquired in 1961. The panel looked into the claim and recommended to the Minister that an ex gratia payment of £125,000 should be made to the owners, with an explanation on the display panel next to the painting of its ownership history.

    The Spoliation Advisory Panel's website reveals that it has dealt with a further six cases since then: a still life in the Burrell collection in Glasgow, which had been taken from a Munich art dealership; a 12th century Missal in the British Library from the cathedral of Benevento, which is still under dispute as it cannot be returned for reasons I shall explain; a portrait by Nikolaus Alexander Mair von Landshut in the Ashmolean museum; four old master drawings, which I shall discuss shortly, in the British Museum; three drawings from the same collection in the Courtauld; three paintings by Rubens, again in the Courtauld; and two pieces of porcelain, one of them in the British Museum and the other in the Fitzwilliam museum.

    So far so good, but the problem is that the law is such that for works held in some collections restitution is not possible and there is no power to "de-acquire"—that is the current term—items, while in other museums the situation can be different. That can lead to unjust, unfair and sometimes downright ludicrous outcomes. Let us consider the two items of porcelain from the same collection. The piece in the Fitzwilliam was returned to the rightful owners, but the piece in the British Museum could not be. In 2005, the panel recommended the return of the Benevento missal, but it still remains in the British Library because of the statutory restriction.

    A key problem arose in 2006 when there was a recommendation of an ex gratia payment for four old master drawings in the British Museum. The claimants had originally sought restitution, and the British Museum had publicly affirmed its wish to restitute, but after four years and a High Court case brought by the British Museum seeking the power to restitute, which failed, the claimants gave up and asked for an ex gratia payment, which was awarded. The details of the case are interesting. There were four items, three of which the museum had bought for nine guineas altogether in 1946 at Sotheby's, and the fourth was part of a 1949 bequest. At the time of the case, the total value was placed at about £150,000. In May 2002, the claim for those four drawings was made by the heirs of Dr. Arthur Feldman; they had been looted by the Gestapo from his renowned collection of old master drawings on 15 March 1939 in Brno in Czechoslovakia.

    In July 2002, the trustees met and agreed that they should refer the dispute to the Spoliation Advisory Panel, but also sought counsel's advice. In August 2003, because of the concerns over the law, the advice of the Attorney-General was sought. He shared the concerns about the legal position and said that under the British Museum Act 1963 disposal was probably prohibited. So, the matter went, in a friendly way, to the High Court, where the Attorney-General had brought the case against the British Museum. Everybody wanted to achieve the return of the objects, but in May 2005 the court ruled that no moral obligation could justify a disposition by the trustees of an object forming part of the collections of the museum. The British Museum wanted to return the objects but could not lawfully do so, and, as I have said, that led to a payment of compensation, which was a rather unsatisfactory result all round.

    In June 2005, I followed that up by tabling a parliamentary question to the then Minister, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tottenham (Mr. Lammy). He replied:

    "We are carefully considering the recent recommendation of the Spoliation Advisory Panel that legislation should be introduced to permit the return of items where possession was lost during the Nazi era. The Vice Chancellor's judgment of 27 May provides clarity in this important area and will contribute to our consideration of the Panel's recommendation."—[ Official Report, 14 June 2005; Vol. 435, c. 235W.]

    In 2006, the Government began a consultation on how to resolve the issue. As I have said, in 2007, three further drawings from the same collection—the Feldman collection—were found in the Courtauld and were able to be restituted because the Courtauld was not caught by this legal restriction that applies to other public collections. We have the position where four of the drawings cannot go back and will remain in the Museum because compensation has been paid, whereas three of the others could be returned.

    The issue was also taken up by Lord Janner in the other place. On 18 December 2007, the next Arts Minister to deal with this was my right hon. Friend the Member for Barking (Margaret Hodge).

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