A government taskforce is being set up to help reopen the cultural sector in England. Overseen by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport and chaired by a DCMS minister, its responsibilities will include tourism, culture and heritage, libraries, entertainment and sport. The group will be one of five official taskforces helping develop new “Covid-19 secure” guidelines specific to different parts of the economy. The other taskforces will oversee pubs and restaurants, non-essential retail, places of worship and international aviation. Separate sectoral sub-groups will be set up under each taskforce to examine issues specific to that sector. A museums and galleries working group is being set up by the recreation and leisure taskforce. It will work with the museum sector on the possible reopening of institutions in England in stage three of the UK government’s plan for lifting lockdown restrictions. The earliest this could take place is 4 July.

The Cultural Renewal Taskforce panel will be led by Neil Mendoza, the architect of the 2017 Mendoza Review of Museums in England. The other members are:

• Mark Cornell, Ambassador theatre Group
• Lord Grade, former chair of the BBC and ITV
• Baroness Lane-Fox, founder of LastMinute.com
• Edward Mellors, Mellors Group Events
• Tamara Rojo, English national Ballet
• Alex Scott, sports broadcaster
• Sir Nicholas Serota, Chair, Arts Council England

Part of Mendoza’s brief will be to collaborate with Arts Council England, National Lottery Heritage Fund, Historic England and other sectoral bodies to develop and deliver a strategy fit to support organisations large and small. The culture secretary, Oliver Dowden also announced £200 million in new funding which will be made available for small charities “that are at the heart of their communities”, but without any specific detail on how much of this – if any – would be available for cultural organisations.

The Welsh and Northern Irish governments have published recovery plans where open-air museums will open before other institutions. Museums Galleries Scotland is working with the Scottish government on plans to reopen the museum sector.

​Whilst this all sounds very heartening, let’s hope that it’s not too little or too late to help British culture and heritage to rebound from the damaging impacts of the coronavirus lockdown.  

Wentworth Woodhouse is an amazing Grade 1 listed country house in South Yorkshire. It has the longest frontage of any building in Britain and, reputedly, has 365 rooms. For years this incredible house was in danger of collapse due to coal mining that had weakened its foundations until, in 2016, the then Chancellor, Philip Hammond, made a grant of £7.6 million for restoration work. Although an estimated £42 million will be needed overall, Wentworth Woodhouse goes from strength to strength. The Preservation Trust has recently reported that phase one of the emergency works programme is almost at an end with like for like replacement of roof slates on the south-east wing, known as Bedlam, the Riding School and the Chapel. The chapel's ceiling has also been restored its the chandelier, that was discovered stored away in a dusty box, has lovingly restored. Work on phase two, to re-slate the east front State Rooms, is already running ahead of schedule.
 
The Camellia House, which is home to some of the oldest and rarest camellias in the Western world, is still roofless and in dire need of restoration, but has received a National Heritage Lottery Fund grant of £1.5 million to transform it into a daytime café and evening events venue. The grant will help to develop proposals for the 18th century menagerie, the Riding School and the southern range of the Stables. Meanwhile, the first donation to the newly-launched Wentworth Woodhouse Wishlist was by local company Spear and Jackson who donated their top-notch trowels, spades, forks and garden loppers to help the site’s volunteers.

https://wentworthwoodhouse.org.uk/