Hepworth gallery funding to be cut by £55,000
The annual pay-out from Wakefield Council to the city’s gallery would drop to £650,000 if proposals are approved.
Council funding of The Hepworth Wakefield is expected to be cut by £50,000 a year.
The annual pay-out from Wakefield Council to the city’s gallery would drop to £650,000 if proposals are approved.
The reduction was first proposed in the authority’s budget plans for the 2025/26 financial year, which was voted through by councillors in March.
The Hepworth building is owned by the council but is operated under an agreement with The Hepworth Wakefield (THW) charitable trust.
The council provides a yearly fee to enable the trust to manage and operate the gallery and take care of the authority’s own fine art collection.
In 2019, the council entered into a four-year agreement to gradually reduce the sum, from its original £1.24m a year when the gallery opened in 2011.
It was part of a plan to distribute funding more widely across the district and to prevent the trust’s “over reliance” on the council.
The current funding arrangement of £700,000 ends in March 2026.
The new funding arrangement would remain in place for three years if cabinet members agree to the proposal at a meeting on December 16.
A report said annual visitor figures for the gallery in 2024/25 were 93,000, with 38% being residents from the Wakefield district.
More than 2.5m people have visited the attraction in the 14 years since it opened.
Residents living within the local authority area are allowed free access to the gallery and visitors from outside of the district pay an entry fee.
The report said: “The council’s sustained investment, alongside that of Arts Council England over the past 14 years, has meant that THW has successfully secured substantial wider funding from donors, trusts and foundations, alongside earned income, including the introduction of entry fees for non-district visitors in 2021.
“These donations and commercial income account for over 50% of its annual turnover.
“THW has consistently been awarded the highest accolade of gold by Visit England for the quality of the visitor attraction – 93% of visitors answering exit surveys say that are ‘extremely likely’ to recommend the gallery.”
The report said work on a new playground and garden workshop, secured through government Levelling Up funding, was expected to be completed next year.