Sackler Trust: Donations - Question

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 3:31 pm on 27 March 2019.

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Photo of Lord Ashton of Hyde Lord Ashton of Hyde The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport 3:31, 27 March 2019

My Lords, with regard to the second question, the Government do support museums. Public funding amounts to about a third of all museum funding, and that is very important. One of the strengths of the museum and gallery sector in this country is that it has a diversified funding stream. The Mendoza review found that the amount of public funding that museums and galleries received over a 10-year period was roughly consonant. I do not think that public vetting of donors is a good idea. I do not think that the Government should be involved in assessing the rightness or wrongness of donors and whether they are suitable. It is very important that public institutions have their own trustees who look at these things, and many of them—the large ones, especially—have ethics committees to do just that.