Astley Hall is a 16th century house in Chorley, Lancashire, that came under local authority ownership in the 1920s. Situated in the middle of the town?s only public park, it holds the legacy of Chorley?s past and is a fantastic asset to the people of the town, claims Louise McCall. It has magnificent plaster ceilings, tapestries and the resonance of a house that was caught up in the Civil War, harboured secret priests and supposedly played host to Oliver Cromwell before the Battle of Preston. Despite all this, the Hall has been subject to drastic budget cuts over the past year.
Budget decisions are never easy, and as a non-statutory service the culture budget, and thus funding to the Hall, was the first to go when money got tight early in 2004. This immediately became a political issue, with opposition parties on Chorley Borough Council making election promises to keep the Hall open as normal and to avoid redundancies. What they didn?t make clear was where the extra money for this would come from. The general presumption that, inevitably, this would mean council tax rises did not go down well with taxpayers.
As a museum service we rely on public money, so it seems only fair that we serve the people of the town in providing access to their heritage and playing a part in the cultural development of the Borough. This is our main aim and forms the basis of everything that is done at the Hall. However, when so many public museums are facing funding crises this seems like an almost impossible situation. One feels as though the museum is being pulled in too many directions by both central and local government, whose agendas we need to fulfil in order to secure funding. New Labour has provided new levels of funding for museums, in particular through the ?Renaissance in the Regions? programme, now set to become a national scheme. This is fantastic for the major museums and their partners, who must work towards government targets and have been able to employ more staff to do so. However, smaller museums must still try to work within agendas without the promise of increased support.
Local government politics appear to have the greatest impact upon small, authority-run museums. We are lucky in that the Council?s executive member for Life and Leisure is a great supporter of what we do, and will speak out for this valued but often underused service. The challenge is to make the museum speak to the people, who should feel a sense of ownership of this magnificent building. In order to get those who hold political power on side, we must work incredibly hard to fit in with the social inclusion and community agendas of both central and local government.
It is essential to continue on a day-to-day basis being aware of the political issues surrounding what we do at the Hall, but ensuring that whatever we do is ?worthy? in the eyes of the Council ? and, most importantly, the taxpayer. When the budget cuts were announced, it was the stakeholders who voiced their concern, rather than the general public of the town, who understandably prefer their council tax to be spent on services such as street cleaning and initiatives to tackle crime. If staff and opening hours were increased at the cost of council tax rises, there would be a public outcry.
Today, it is more important than ever for local authority curators to be creative and to source as much external funding as possible in order to carry out projects that fit political agendas, and, at the same time, to aim to get taxpayers to appreciate the Hall. As museums are returning to their 19th century purpose of improving society, the curator can no longer exclude those who ultimately pay for the service ? we have to be open and be seen to be improving lives in the same manner as schools, hospitals and universities. Learning how do achieve this and also to deal with the personalities within the Council is essential in order to maintain a balanced service; this often feels like an uphill struggle.
Louise McCall is Curator of the Astley Hall Museum and Art Gallery in Chorley.
t: 01257 515557;
w: http://www.chorley.gov.uk/astleyhall