Volume 2

The funding of science and discovery centres : eleventh report of session 2006-07 / House of Commons, Science and Technology Committee.

  • Great Britain. Parliament. House of Commons. Select Committee on Science and Technology.
Date:
2007
Catalogue details

Licence: Open Government Licence

Credit: The funding of science and discovery centres : eleventh report of session 2006-07 / House of Commons, Science and Technology Committee. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    Q28 Dr Iddon: What about non-Millennium Commission buildings and centres? I have had to struggle with the Catalyst, for example. There are so many of those; I think there are 83 of these altogether across the country that I counted the other day and is it 12 millennium centres? Ms Conlon: Yes. Q29 Dr Iddon: So, there are an awful lot outside the millennium ring that are in difficulty as well. Why are they in difficulty? Ms Conlon: | think that they struggled quietly for many years and I think that they have been particularly entrepreneurial and imaginative in securing funding. I think it is also worth pointing out that, when you think of the millennium centres, they are big. At that time, we were all encouraged to think big. So, they are expensive buildings to run. Colin was making the point when we were talking earlier that actually you have very small to medium size businesses with turnovers typically of maybe £2/£3 million operating in buildings which would suggest that they are medium to large size. They have energy issues; they have replenishment issues; they have building maintenance issues. I think that the problem has been highlighted with the arrival of the millennium centres. I think that a number of the smaller centres have done jolly well, but I think it is fair to say that they too have struggled but perhaps ona smaller scale and on not such a noticeable scale. Q30 Dr Iddon: What do they need, capital funding or revenue funding? Ms Conlon: They need both. Unless you are a centre in a tourist destination like Edinburgh or York or London for example, typically you will depend upon local people; you will depend upon people who are coming from about 45 minutes to an hour’s drive time and they will only come back if there are new things. New things means replenishment. Ideally, a centre should totally replenish within a ten year timeframe. We are talking about exhibits which are expensive and we are talking about a lot of money, but we are also talking about a real desire in the sector to be able to provide educational experiences free of charge so that every child has an entitlement, a science enrichment entitlement, and, if we could receive funding to offer that entitlement to children, then that would be wonderful. So, it is a balance: it is a balance of capital and, curiously, it is probably slightly easier to get one’s hands on capital than it is on revenue because revenue is never quite so exciting a case to make as for capital. However, in answer to your question, we need both. Q31 Dr Iddon: May I bring our other three witnesses in as perhaps they want to comment on this question. Mr Winfield: | would like to fly the flag for a self- sufficient science centre. I agree with everything that Linda has said and we do have the same challenges as all the other science centres and generally we have the situation where admissions income and all the ancillary income from things like the shop, cafeteria and so on are subsidising our education provision. So, in order to do more education, which is our aim and our main focus—all our goals and objectives which are all around education—and do it well and do more of it, we need to ensure that we get good income from the other areas. That means that it is okay to survive but survival is not enough because, as Linda said, there is refreshment of the exhibition or development of the exhibition or other features in the science centre and, if you do not do those sorts of things, then your income drops off, you cannot then subsidise your education provision and, as a result, the outcomes drop off as well. My science centre is self sufficient, we break even, but we do not have enough money to be able to do lots of development that we would like to do to improve our education provision and the demand for our education services is greater than what we can supply at the moment. Q32 Dr Iddon: If the Government took over all the funding that comes from so many different sources at the moment and there was core funding available for all 83 science centres in the broader sense, do you think that there would be room for the entrepreneurs to develop something different? In its time, Eureka at Halifax was different, for example. With the greatest of respect, there are a lot of aquariums, not quite like The Deep, I admit, or the one at Plymouth but they are exceptional, but a lot of towns have aquariums. If somebody wanted to go in a different direction and create something quite different in this broad remit of science centres, do you think that if there were core funding available that could happen? Ms Conlon: Yes, | do. If you look at the situation in the States, for example, there is a national science foundation. I do not think that any of us in the science centre world are expecting to get an automatic and regular handout. We are prepared to work hard for any money that comes to us and we are prepared to have any of our proposals peer reviewed. I think that actually stimulates new ideas and new thinking. Yes, it is very important to have some core funding pinned against education initiatives but, in the science centres today, we are living in a very fast moving world, controversial, sensitive, cutting-edge, scary science, and we are always looking for innovative ways of engaging with the public and I think that any proposal for money should be peer reviewed and we should only receive that money if our proposals are robust, if they stand up to scrutiny and, in turn, we can learn from some of the good projects and proposals and that in turn can be disseminated throughout the science centre sector. Q33 Dr Iddon: Is there room for failure? Ms Conlon: \s there room for failure? Q34 Dr Iddon: If somebody wanted to try something rather special? Ms Conlon: Yes. If the money is there, of course, yes. It depends on priorities. Do you want to play it safe or is there some money available to try and be entrepreneurial and to think outside the box? That would be wonderful. We would welcome that.