Heritage blighted by a decade of austerity | Letters
Your coverage of the staff restructuring by Leicester museums in response to funding cuts ('Engagement team' replaces curators at Leicester museums, 14 March) is hardly fair. A decade of austerity has forced even local authorities that, like Leicester, value their cultural institutions highly to make impossible choices. Social care or arts? Children's services or museums?
For over 30 years most regional museum funding has targeted audience engagement. This has unfortunately been at the expense of curatorial and other care for the public asset represented by the collection, even in museums with collections designated by government as being of national importance, albeit not so funded. When shops, pubs and restaurants are closing, museums and their collections are among the few attractions left to draw people into our town and city centres. No other country would have allowed its family silver to tarnish so badly.
Dr Ellen McAdam
Director, Birmingham Museums