Committee publication · Correspondence · 2 September 2025
Letter from Andrew Lovett, Director and Chief Executive, Black Country Living Museum, regarding Protecting built heritage oral evidence follow-up, 18 July 2025
From: Culture, Media and Sport Committee
Inquiry: Protecting built heritage
Summary
Andrew Lovett, CEO of Black Country Living Museum, provides a follow-up summary to his oral evidence to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee on protecting built heritage. He advocates for stronger advocacy messaging around heritage value, increased funding for the Museums Estates & Development Fund, more flexible planning approaches for listed buildings, recognition of tourism-heritage links, knowledge-sharing expectations, and continuation of Museums & Galleries Exhibition Tax Relief.
Key findings
- MEND (Museums Estates & Development Fund) Round 5 has £25m allocation but demonstrates significant unmet need: 537 expressions of interest across four rounds yielded only 120 funded projects (22% success rate)
- Approximately one-quarter to one-third of Arts Council England National Portfolio operates from listed buildings, illustrating built heritage's centrality to UK cultural programming
- VisitBritain research shows 7 in 10 domestic leisure trips are to film or TV locations, many at historic sites, highlighting tourism dependency on heritage preservation
- Museums & Galleries Exhibition Tax Relief has supported 6,430 exhibitions across venues from blockbuster shows to smaller local museums since its introduction
- Planning officers should adopt more pragmatic approaches to listed building development; current perfectionism impedes progress on heritage-led projects
Tone
ProceduralTopics
Key actors
Andrew Lovett, Black Country Living Museum Trust, Dame Caroline Dinenage MP, Arts Council England, National Lottery Heritage Fund, Wolfson Foundation, VisitBritain
Notable line
“Built heritage is authentic evidence of the endlessly fascinating human psyche and therefore …”
Key Quotes
“It is the evidence of how far we have come, and therefore, provides us with confidence about how far we can still go”
“… all too often, "perfection is the enemy of progress", or "the best is the enemy of the good."”
“The link between and mutual dependency of tourism-hospitality and protecting built heritage is profound.”
“VisitBritain research shows that 7 in 10 domestic leisure trips have been to a film or TV location, including many historic sites”
Source · parliament.uk record ↗