From: Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council

6 April 2009

Dear Mr Clarke,

Firstly, my apologies for the delay in responding to you. Thank you for taking the time to contact us again about plans for the future development of Broadfield House Glass Museum and the museum’s staff.

In response to the two specific points for which you seek confirmation:

Broadfield House Glass Museum will not close until new and improved facilities are ready.

Any plans for the future of the glass museum will be subject to a far reaching feasibility study and full and open consultation.

The trained staff at Broadfield House Glass Museum, who know and understand these internationally important collections, will be offered similar positions in any new museum.

If the feasibility study criteria is met and a formal council decision made staff would be redeployed either at Red House Glass Works Museum or other locations within the council as part of the council’s redeployment policy. If criteria are not met staff would stay at Broadfield House or at other locations within the terms of their respective current terms of employment contract.

Thank you for your offer of assistance with the feasibility study. We are in the process of appointing a consultant to lead the study and will pass on your details. To enable you to keep up to date with the progress of the feasibility study, we have set up a dedicated section on our website www.dudley.gov.uk. The questions and answers’ section will be updated in line with work being undertaken.

Thank you once again for your continued interest in Broadfield House Glass Museum.

Your sincerely

John Millar
Director of the urban environment

Dear David

News has come out, that Dudley Council is considering the closure of Broadfield House, with an envisaged move of all the glass collections and facilities to the Red House Cone site, as from March 2010.

This is just an initial query, to ascertain the true intent of the council.

Along with The Glass Circle and The Friends of Broadfield House, we have an enormous interest in ensuring that if there is to be a move ( we are aware that Broadfield House, though having “a name” in the glass world, is not sacrosanct – a better facility could easily be envisaged ),the move should be a step up and not down. Our concerns are that as a world class facility, the collections should remain on view, those in store at Broadfield and Himley Hall should have room to be viewed and that the library and research facility should remain intact and accessible. It would also be desirable for a modern lecture facility to be established.

Yours Sincerely

Brian J Clarke
Chairman
The Glass Association

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Further to your email to Councillor David Caunt, Leader of Dudley Council, he has asked me to respond on his behalf.

I fully appreciate the concerns that you have expressed in your e-mail and as the Assistant Director responsible for the Council’s Culture and Leisure Services I too would wish to see that any change in the way that the Glass Heritage and Collections of the Borough are exhibited and made available to the public as an improvement  on current arrangements.

That said I am also aware of the Council’s difficult budget position which is unlikely to improve in the current economic climate and the fact that the task that we face in delivering an amalgamation of the two glass heritage facilities will be challenging.

To this end we are establishing a project group to take the matter forward and the Select Committee for Regeneration and Culture has included the project within its work programme for the 2009/10 municipal years with reports being presented in order that the Committee is apprised of developments on a regular basis.

I trust that for present purposes this answer is sufficient for your purposes given that there is a considerable amount of work to be done and debate to be had.

Yours sincerely
Duncan Lowndes
Assistant Director Culture and Leisure

Dear David

As chairman of The Glass Association, I was stunned when told that Dudley Council is proposing to close the Broadfield House Museum and move the collections and research resource through to The Red House Cone site, as from March 2010.

We have spoken with staff, councillors, the Friends of Broadfield House and many other people interested and involved in the world of glass.

At present, at the Red House Cone, there is not enough exhibition space for its own purpose and there is no adequate, modern lecture space. The collections of Broadfield House cannot fit in; the research material, library and collections would be hidden away. Because of this, the owners of the loan collections (which include the Friends of Broadfield House) may well want them returned. Furthermore, there is already a large amount of glass in store at Broadfield House and at Himley Hall which is not displayed!

It would be a major loss for glass researchers, makers, enthusiasts and collectors, for the internationally important resources of Broadfield House to be lost to use; it is the repository of major glass collections, especially of the 20th century Stourbridge area. As one of the two main glass attractions, bringing visitors to Stourbridge, it would also be a loss to Dudley Council.

The Red House Cone site is owned by Waterford Wedgwood. I understand that Dudley Council has a lease on most of the area, but not the Stuart shop, the tea rooms and some of the buildings at the back of the site. It would seem that no decisions can reasonably be made until the intentions of the administrators / new owners of Waterford Wedgwood are known.

The manner in which this exercise has been carried out suggests that Dudley Council are trying to drive this through before those who care can do much about it. There had been no prior consultation, there has been no detailed financial or practical evaluation. No thought seems to have been given to the possibility of external funding and the time scale is incredibly short within which to consider the issues of such an important heritage.

If designed as a cost cutting exercise, one authority has stated his opinion that the only way Dudley Council can save money is to close Broadfield House down completely and either box up the collection for posterity, or sell it!  Is that your wish? If not, then a properly funded examination of the costs of moving the collections and creating a superior facility at The Red House Cone need to be carried out; with a full consultation with all interested parties.

If a move is attempted to The Red House Cone Site without preparation, it would seem to be very short sighted, leading to disastrous consequences: The Tower of London without the Crown Jewels.

In view of the above, The Glass Association is totally against this premature move unless and until the Red House Cone site is fully prepared, in order to show as a minimum, the collections that are at the moment displayed and that adequate facilities are created to house the research material. They both need to be readily accessible. Ideally, new lecture facilities would also be created.

Having just been informed that a final decision is to be made at a Dudley Council meeting on March 2nd, I consider that David Lowndes’s reply to my email to you (see The Glass Association website), at best, very misleading.

As leader of Dudley Council, you probably have a difficult position these days in delivering services within a budget. I suspect that your leadership is paramount in directing the council. I cannot see, that it would be advantageous to you to embark on a course of action with the heritage of the contents of Broadfield House, if the final result was either a de facto abandonment of the collections, or you realised rather late in the day what a move to a superior location would entail, both practically and financially.

I hope that you will be able to engage in meaningful discussions with ourselves amongst others.

Yours Sincerely

Brian Clarke

Chairman
The Glass Association

Dear Sir/Madam

Broadfield House

Thank you for your letter, which I have read with great interest.

I fully appreciate the concerns that you and others have raised regarding the future of the Borough’s Internationally renowned Glass Collections and how they can be preserved and enhanced for future generations.

I would like to firstly explain that we are not shutting the glass museum and attempting to either put the collections in the existing space at Redhouse Cone or into storage, which appears to be a major worry for many people who have contacted me.

The location of Broadfield House is not ideal from the point of view of a visitor attraction. It is not easily accessible to many people who visit the Red House Cone, which is shown, by the number of visitors to each Museum. There are in excess of 20,000 more visitors to the Cone each year, which is one of the reasons why I would like to look at the option of relocating the entire collection to a single site. Clearly, this would have to entail an expansion of the existing Red House site. 

I have called for a study on the feasibility of moving the collections and housing them in the Glass Quarter at The Red House Cone.

I appreciate that this will not be a process that can happen overnight and there will be a great deal of work that needs to be completed to ensure that we have covered all bases and understand fully the complexity and cost of what we would like to achieve. 

I see this very much as an opportunity to enhance and improve the services provided to visitors and glass enthusiasts, set in the context of how the traditional glass was produced and I want to be certain that this can be achieved before any decisions are taken.

Sadly, armed with only a small amount of information, the press don’t always reflect the full picture of what is trying to be achieved and therefore I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to explain more fully.

It is heartening to know that there are so many people who care passionately about glass and its place in the boroughs heritage and I will do everything possible to ensure that its place is preserved, protected and enhanced.

I will make sure that we retain your contact details and keep you updated of any progress which will also give you the opportunity to be included in the consultation on any fully worked proposals that may come from our study.

Yours faithfully

Cllr Karen Shakespeare
Halesowen North Ward Councillor

Cabinet Member for the Environment & Culture

Dear Councillors,

Thank you for your letter of explanation on the proposed closure of Broadfield House, mailed out on the 26th January to those who had contacted you with their concerns.

The letter seeks to reassure us, however, anomalies remain between the statements in the letter and actions taken in Dudley Council meetings and at Broadfield House. I hope that you are now in a position to clarify the council’s  position.

I would like to correct your assumption regarding our information. It does not come from the press. It comes from your own council documents, meetings and other interested parties in the Stourbridge area.

I shall not dwell on the value of the collections and archives to the international glass world. Here we agree.

On the 5th January, council officers, including Mr.Lowndes met with the staff of Broadfield House; they were told that Broadfield House Museum would close by the end of March 2010 and that staff would be redeployed or made redundant. If redeployed, it would be unlikely to be in the museum sector.

On the 7th January, a council meeting agreed to a “Review of Museums Services” which identified £120,000 to be saved in this sector. Only Broadfield House was mentioned. The document states:-

Review of Museums Service - It has been established in the Councils Capital Strategy for a number of years that the amalgamation of the Red House Glass Cone and Broadfield House Glass Museum could lead to an improved visitor attraction and a better heritage asset. During the 2009-10 financial year further feasibility work will be undertaken in order that the collections and services currently provided at the Broadfield House site could be relocated and integrated at the Red House Glass Cone thereby focusing the Councils glass heritage assets within the Glass Quarter and allowing the Council to dispose of Broadfield House and realise a capital receipt in due course. These plans will be targeted in time for the start of the 2010-11 financial year when it has been assumed savings of £120,000 per annum will be achieved.

You clearly state that you will not shut the glass museum ( at Broadfield House ? ) nor put the collections into the existing space in the Red House Cone site OR into storage.

Yet, the feasibility study, for which I understand that professional fees in excess of £30,000 were quoted, has not been carried out; “savings” have not yet been identified, and the “costs” of expanding the Red House Cone site ( the stated aim in your emailed letter ) have not been investigated.

The guidelines for the creation of a new and improved museum facility have not yet been stated.

No steps seem to have been taken to source funding external to the Council’s budget.

I’m sure that you are taking into account the vast expense in creating a new museum with new display cabinets, lecture facilities with modern audio-visual devices; wrapping, moving, insurance and interim storage of the exhibits ( glass and archive materials ), all with up to date cataloguing.

The time frame for the above endeavours would stretch over a considerable amount of time, even once an exact site had been identified and purchased. (compare with the recent “in house” move of the glass galleries at the V&A, itself taking around two years).

Your letter talks of “enhancement & improvement of services provided to visitors and glass enthusiasts before any decisions are taken.”

You have a council meeting on the 2nd March, at which I understand the council’s future budget will be ratified and only then on 4th March are you looking at a feasibility study.

Your stated wishes in the emailed letter to us are laudable, but they don’t square up with the actions and statements the council is making and they take no account of the time frame required for the whole endeavour.

Following your emailed letter and taking the above issues into account, could you please now confirm that:

1. Broadfield House Museum will not close until new and improved facilities are ready.
2. The trained staff at Broadfield House, who know and understand these internationally important collections, will be offered similar positions in any new museum

We would be delighted to assist you with a feasibility study, looking at creating a first rate facility for the internationally renowned collections and archives held at Broadfield House, a “jewel in the crown” of the Black Country’s cultural heritage.

Yours Sincerely

Brian Clarke
Chairman
The Glass Association