Letter to the Press: Barnet Council Museum Auction
Dear Editor,
When the Conservatives first started privatising public assets, the metaphorical saying was that they were selling off the country’s “family silver”. Now, Barnet Council Conservatives have gone one stage further and are doing so literally, with their decision to auction off the museum exhibits from Church Farmhouse Museum- and not just the Borough’s “family silver” either, but its pottery, books, textiles, coins, and all manner of domestic items, too.
The Conservatives attempt to justify their Philistine approach to all things cultural, including our Borough’s Museums with their obsession with cuts, but this decision means that once we are out of recession and growth returns, there can be no going back: if the collection is dispersed it is gone forever.
Closing the Museum was bad enough, but the auction is being conducted with undue haste in a couple of weeks’ time, miles away in Nuneaton, so any local residents who might want to reclaim an item, or indeed buy something themselves, are especially disadvantaged as against the antiques dealers who are set to make a killing.
I particularly highlight the impact of the loss of the Museum’s work with schoolchildren, with a hands on approach to demonstrating our heritage through the artefacts exhibited there- undoubtedly the best way to bring our shared social history to life, especially for children whose families may have originated elsewhere in the world and who would otherwise have had no direct exposure to the traditions of life in Barnet.
This sell off is a disgraceful breach of trust with those who loaned or donated items over decades, to make the Museum the success story that it was. At the very least, items should have been returned to the donors who might have wanted to offer there heirlooms to other museums or institutions, rather than the council making a windfall profit from these donated objects.
Yours faithfully,
Andrew Dismore AM
Chair of Trustees, Council of British Archaeology, London
Labour London Assembly member for Banret and Camden
