Museum fees begin despite fears over future

Visitors to a museum will face entrance fees from Monday, despite fears the new charges will not save the institution in the long term.

Oxford City Council voted to introduce a £4 standard fee and £2 charge for concessions to visit the Museum of Oxford in October last year.

A spokesperson for the local authority said the charges would "support the continuation" of the museum's work.

But a Freedom of Information request filed by a campaign group against the charges has shown the fees are expected to result in a decline in visitors.

A confidential council report into the charges from 2024, made public by a request from the Save Our Museum campaign, found that introducing the fee would not solve the museum's financial issues.

Whilst charging "helps the bottom line", it would result in the museum making a loss, the report found.

It also suggested the fees would also "limit fundraising" and counter the museum's "core purpose due to the drop in visitors", the number of which it estimated would drop by roughly half.

"While this represents a saving of £70,000 on the current position of [the museum], both models make a loss, suggesting a different kind of change is required than introducing a charge," it added.

A member of Save Our Museum, which was established to oppose the entry fee, said: "The council is claiming its decision to introduce an entrance fee is supporting the museum, but it's actually doing the opposite.

"As the council's own commissioned research concluded, charging for this small peoples' history museum in a city of much bigger free museums will lead to a significant drop in footfall and not generate enough revenue."

"We fear for the long-term future of the museum and question the council's commitment to it," the campaigner added.

A spokesperson for the city council said all income raised through the charge would be "reinvested directly into the museum and its programmes".

"The Museum of Oxford remains committed to being a welcoming, inclusive, and affordable civic space, rooted in the belief that history is shaped by many voices."

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