• The Museum Renewal Fund is an urgent intervention to support civic museums most at risk from acute financial pressures.

• Birmingham Museums Trust to receive £995,000.

• The award will reduce the trust’s financial shortfall and fund activities to generate additional income.

Birmingham Museums is to receive £995,000 from a government fund to support museums most at risk from acute financial pressures caused by rising operating costs and loss of funding from local authorities.  

The £20 million Museum Renewal Fund was announced by Lisa Nandy, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, in February 2025.  

It is an urgent intervention targeted at museums owned or directly maintained by local authority funding or with a governance link to a local authority, to safeguard the vital community engagement and impact which public access to museums enables.  

The money awarded to Birmingham Museums will fund various income generating and audience engagement initiatives including seven-day opening at Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery, marketing, support for fundraising activity and further work with its citizens’ jury, which presented a set of recommendations to help inform Birmingham Museums’ transformation strategy earlier this year.  

The funding period is for the financial year 2025-26, with all funds to be committed/spent by 31 January 2026.

Sara Wajid and Zak Mensah, co-chief executives of Birmingham Museums Trust, said:

“We are very grateful for this much needed financial assistance from the Museum Renewal Fund, which will enable us to reduce the trust’s financial shortfall and fund activities to generate additional income.

“But while the funding will make a real difference in the short term, it must be spent by the end of January next year, which underlines how temporary this support is.  

“We need this to be just the start: the civic museum sector requires a sustained, long-term financial strategy so that we can plan ahead confidently, care for our collections properly, serve our communities fully and ensure that these institutions of such vital cultural importance are resilient into the future.”

Councillor Saima Suleman, Cabinet Member for Digital, Culture, Heritage and Tourism at Birmingham City Council, said:

“All credit to Birmingham Museums Trust management and trustees in securing significant support from the Museum Renewal Fund. 

“Whilst this funding is non-recurring, it will resolve the Trust’s immediate financial pressure and, importantly, fund investment in activities to generate additional income. The city council is doing all it can within its means to support the Trust’s activity going forward. 

“Birmingham Museums remain one of the city’s most treasured cultural institutions with a diverse and innovative array of collections, activities, and exhibitions across our city for both residents and visitors to enjoy.”

Jon Finch, chair of the English Civic Museums Network, said:  

“The English Civic Museums Network (ECMN) welcomes Arts Council England’s (ACE) announcement on the distribution of the Museum Renewal Fund, a fund that ECMN’s steering group and members had actively lobbied the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) to establish. This vital investment represents an essential lifeline for many museums across the country.

"Museums continue to face a range of unprecedented and long-term challenges that pose serious risks to their sustainability. Recent changes to national insurance contributions, coupled with rising inflation and increases to the minimum wage, are among the pressures intensifying the wider economic uncertainty at local, regional, and national levels.

"Across England, museums bring people together to connect with their heritage, the world around them, and with each other. They sit at the heart of their communities and act as custodians of the nation’s stories for current and future generations. This funding will help civic museums continue to serve their communities while also investing in new initiatives to strengthen long-term financial resilience.

"In addition to their cultural and social value, museums play a vital role in the economy. As a sector, with many institutions that are civic in nature, museums have been shown to deliver over £1.45 billion of economic output locally, regionally and nationally. This equates to approximately £3 of economic return for every £1 of public sector investment.

"We are especially grateful to ACE and DCMS for recognising the needs of the sector and for moving swiftly to establish and administer this fund. ECMN looks forward to working with both organisations to build on this momentum by identifying opportunities for greater investment, stronger partnerships, and practical policy changes to ensure that communities across England can continue to access the vital resources provided by civic museums.”