By Adrian Murphy
Today’s Budget announced by Chancellor George Osborne has extended the museum VAT refund eligibility from national and university museums to include free museums across the country
The VAT refund will allow all free museums and galleries to claim back VAT incurred on most goods and services purchased in order to continue to offer free admission. The budget will also see tax relief for temporary and touring exhibition costs from April 2017 with a consultation taking place in the summer.
As well as this the Budget announced a number of funds for museums including the V&A Museum of Design in Dundee, Being Brunel, part of ss Great Britain and Brooklands Museum.
The budget awarded funds to the following creative projects:
• £5m to the V&A in Dundee’s fundraising campaign
• £620,000 to support Being Brunel,the National Brunel Project in Bristol at ss Great Britain
• £1m to Brooklands Museum to complete fundraising for the Brooklands Aircraft Factory and Race Track Revival Project
• £27,000 of funding per year from 2017-18 to 2019-20 to the Lloyd George Museum in Gwynedd. The museum’s local authority funding has been cut from April 2017
• £200,000 to We’ll Meet Again to establish a permanent interactive world war two museum in Lincolnshire
• £659,000 to the Scottish Submarine Trust to establish a Museum of the Submarine Service in Scotland
• £1.23m to the British Mercantile Marine Memorial Collection to establish a unique collection of international maritime art in Hull
• £14m to STEAMhouse in Digbeth, Birmingham, subject to the business case to establish a creative innovation centre bringing together arts and culture with science, technology, engineering and maths
• £1m to support S1 Artspace to create an arts complex in Sheffield, subject to planning permission being granted
• £13m to Hull UK City of Culture 2017