Agenda item

The Cabinet Member for Community Leadership & Engagement introduced a report providing an overview of Heritage Services, expressing pride in the Borough’s history and heritage which offered historical sites such as Eastbury Manor House, Valence House, as well as the future Woman’s Museum. The Borough was one of the fastest changing in the country, making equality and diversity at the heart of everything the Council did, as reflected in its refreshed Corporate Plan. Having said that, culture and heritage was an area that had been de-prioritised in the face of austerity and financial challenges, which meant that these services had to find creative solutions to continue these services and make them at the heart of our communities.

The Head of Culture (HC) delivered a presentation on the Council’s Heritage Service, which covered the following:

·  Staff roles and services on offer;

·  Adapting services to meet the needs of residents going forward;

·  Becontree Forever Programme;

·  Financial challenges arising from chronic underfunding;

·  Key areas of focus over the next 3 years;

·  Risks and Obstacles and strategies to overcome these; and

·  Difficult decisions ahead to protect the Borough’s heritage.

Standing Orders were suspended at this juncture, to allow the meeting to continue beyond 9.00 pm.

In response to questions, the Director for Inclusive Growth (DIG) and the HC, stated that:

·  Delaying the Women’s Museum was not the solution to the Heritage Service’s financial challenges, which had been primarily caused by chronic underfunding spanning over more than a decade, and using very traditional models of funding, which were no longer viable. To bring the Service to a more financially stable position, the Council would need to make some difficult decisions, increase its fund-raising efforts, and build solid working partnerships by engaging with third sector organisations, the community and volunteers. Some Community Infrastructure Levy funds had been identified to support the Women’s Museum so that there would be no in-year budgetary pressures for the next two years by opening this site. After two years however, the Museum would need to find a financially sustainable model to continue running. Ideas around how this could be achieved were already being considered, such as the renting of spaces to companies looking for workshop spaces;

·  The Council did recognise the good name of the National Trust and worked closely with them where possible – for example, Eastbury Manor House was listed on the National Trust website and they had also taken on Stoneford Cottage; however, as conditions, the green spaces and kitchen would need to be refurbished.; and

·  There was wide kudos and recognition that the Council’s heritage sites were valuable spaces for the community, for example Valence House had been nominated for the family friendly museum award; however, the challenges in Heritage services were a result of an accumulation of underfunding over a number of years and would take time to address.

Councillor Achilleos commented that he felt strongly that consideration should be given to postponing the opening of the Women's Museum for one or more financial years until the local authority had built more financial resilience into the heritage sector. Whilst he recognised the importance and significance of the museum delivery for local women and the Council’s ongoing commitment to equality and diversity, until it could bring down the annual overspend across the sector by utilising a combination of grant funding and more innovative asset management, he was concerned that the addition of a new museum would not be financially responsible. He also stated that he would feed back to the office of the MP for Dagenham and Rainham, where Valence House was located, the need to use its communications functions to encourage investment and support statements to support bids for improvements to the site.

Members made a number of further comments in relation to overcoming the current financial challenges within the Council’s heritage services, summarised below:

·  It was clear that the HC had worked tirelessly to raise funds. The Service was encouraged to look at commercially advertising the sites for new purposes; and

·  Difficult decisions would need to be made in relation to staffing; however, staff need to be utilised in a new, more commercial way to raise income- for example, by encouraging businesses to use the sites for their conferences or workshops, or perhaps even looking at offering one of the sites to the public as a wedding venue, which the Borough did not currently have.