By John Baron
Kirkstall’s councillors hope Abbey House Museum could be maintained for community use after council chiefs unveiled plans to close the facility.
Abbey House Museum could be closed as the cash-strapped council seeks to slash more than £100m from its budget.
Job losses, building closures and a council tax rise of almost five per cent are also being considered by the authority.
In a statement this afternoon, Councillor Hannah Bithell, Andy Rontree and Fiona Venner (Lab, Kirkstall) described the decision as ‘incredibly difficult’.
They said: “It has had declining numbers of visitors for many years and with the 70% cuts to government funding that the council has faced over the last 14 years it can no longer be sustained. In 2025-26 we will have to make a further £104m of savings and after 14 years we are already cut to the bone, so things no-one wanted to see happen are having to be included in the proposals.
“We know how much this museum means to our community, especially as so many people will have visited there on school trips over several decades.
“To this end we are looking to find a solid community use for this building so that it can remain open to use to all of us. This could involve a community asset transfer, like Bramley Baths where a building transfers to a community group.
“We will convene a meeting just after Christmas for any interested community organisations who would like to be involved, so if your organisation is interested please e-mail hannah.bithell@leeds.gov.uk so I can send invites.”
The councillors said the collection housed in the museum would not be lost, but will be reallocated around the city’s museums and galleries estate.
“It is worth noting that the online budget consultation opens today. We will include the link in our weekly updates whilst it is open so you can easily access it,” they added.
“The Abbey Visitor Centre and the Abbey itself will remain open. The budget does however include a proposal to widen the scope of charging for entry to the ruins.”
Leeds City Council says visitor numbers have declined from 70,000 to 40,000 and are still falling.
Typical of the short sighted and useless attitudes of councils and councilors, in these times of restrictions that are being imposed on the population of towns and cities such as Leeds when such amenities are needed more than ever for the public to be able to visit and take families for days out and to learn about the environment and history of where people live, they are been priced out of the reach of residents by the imposition of swinging car park charges and now the threats of closing more public assets that have already been paid for by residents through council taxes and such like.
Perhaps if councils and councilors thought more about the wasted millions on projects that serve no purpose other than for the favoured few such as arenas and centralised sports centres (they never learned the lesson of the so called olympic baths did they!) and forced closure of the local sports centres that served so many for years to justify the building of such horrendous and useless sports facilities for named councilors to have their names forever written on some soon to be forgotten metal plates!
And yet they can find countless millions to build cycle lanes that no one uses
Totally agree to that, years off traffic congestion to make these little used cycle lanes. Our children loved Pudsey park’s animal house, we did go to various zoos etc but they still loved going, and it was free so everyone could enjoy it, the council closed that which was a massive shame.