Oral Answers to Questions

Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston Excerpts

Wednesday 16th December 2015 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I am delighted to join my hon. Friend in saying that it was the right decision to make sure we have this extra funding for the police. By the end of the spending settlement, it is actually an increase of £900 million in cash terms by 2019-20. I am delighted that there will be more officers on the streets in Hampshire. I come back to the same point: you cannot fund the NHS, you cannot fund the Home Office, and you cannot fund the police unless you have a growing economy with more jobs, people paying their taxes, and making sure you have got a strong and stable economy, and that is what is happening in Britain today.

[Ms Gisela Stuart (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab)]

Q8. In his farewell speech, the outgoing director of the British Museum said:“The British Museum is perhaps the noblest dream that parliament has ever dreamt. Parliament decided to make a place where the world could be under one roof, where the collection would be free to all native or foreign, where every citizen would have the right to information and where all inquiry would be outside political control.” Does the Prime Minister agree that the partnership working of the British Museum, such as that with the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery for its multi-faith gallery next year, is important, but that such work will not happen unless our museums and galleries continue to be funded properly?

[The Prime Minister]

Let me join the right hon. Lady in paying tribute not only to the British Museum, which is an absolute jewel in the British cultural crown, but to Neil MacGregor, who gave it such extraordinary leadership. Given her heritage, perhaps she will be amused by the fact that I took Chancellor Merkel to the museum to show her the brilliant exhibition about Germany—it was fantastic—but the next thing I knew, the Germans had poached Neil MacGregor to run their cultural institute in Germany. None the less, in the spirit of European co-operation, which is going to be vital this week, I am happy to see that happen. I want to see the British Museum complete all its partnerships, not just across the United Kingdom but internationally. The right hon. Lady will have seen in the autumn statement that the British Museum got a funding settlement with which it was, rightly, very pleased.