UNESCO: 80th Anniversary

John Whitby Excerpts

Tuesday 18th November 2025 Westminster Hall

[John Whitby (Derbyshire Dales) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Dowd. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Mid Derbyshire (Jonathan Davies) on securing this important debate.

UNESCO was founded from the ashes of the second world war out of a recognition that we must protect our unique cultural heritage for generations to come. The Derbyshire dales are filled with unique landscapes, heritage and history, and at the heart of this is Cromford Mills, which was built in 1771 and was the world’s first water-powered cotton spinning mill. Alongside other sites in Derbyshire, it ushered in the birth of the factory system and the industrial revolution, helping pioneer changes that would leave our nation and the world irrevocably changed.

To visit Arkwright’s mill in Cromford is to visit the very birthplace of mass production. It would be remiss of me not to mention Masson Mills just half a mile away, another of Arkwright’s mills, built in 1783. A commercial spinning mill until 1991, it is now home to a textile museum and, incidentally, powered by hydro-electric energy generated on site. However, Arkwright’s mill at Cromford was his first, unique in having survived as a cohesive group of buildings, and therefore is a key destination within the Derwent Valley Mills world heritage site, which is a designated UNESCO world heritage site and the only UNESCO site in the east midlands.

The designation of the site helps to ensure that future generations can continue to visit and learn from this historic location, with more than 200,000 visitors each year. It is hard to believe that before the Arkwright Society purchased the site in 1979, the site appeared to be heading for demolition. By that time, many of the buildings had fallen into disrepair, much of it had been contaminated with lead chromate and many of the historic features had been obscured by modern buildings. However, the hard work and vision of the Arkwright Society saved this site of international significance and turned it into the tourist attraction that it is today. The designation of Cromford Mills as a UNESCO world heritage site also aided that process, as it helped secure funding, boost visitor numbers and gave it legal protection.

Unfortunately, the hard work of preserving and restoring the site is not yet complete. It costs over £4,000 each day to maintain the site. Although the Arkwright Society generates income through catering, retail, heritage tours and tenancies, and receives additional income from donations and grants, this income remains less than it costs to maintain Cromford Mills.

Fortunately, the Arkwright Society has managed to secure £1.3 million from the National Lottery Heritage Fund to transform the four-storey mill building located at the heart of the site. None the less, although this funding is welcome, Cromford Mills needs further support to ensure that the site can remain financially viable for future generations. In particular, the Arkwright Society needs £150,000 a year to stabilise core operations and around £1.2 million in match funding to enable the full delivery of the renewal project.

I urge the Government and donors to do whatever they can to ensure that the Arkwright Society can access the funding it needs. I also encourage the Minister to instruct officials at the Department for Culture, Media and Sport to speak with the Arkwright Society and Cromford Mills to see what support they might be able to provide through these challenging times.

Cromford Mills demonstrates that our industrial legacy is not just a story about our past. Instead, with the right investment, such sites can continue to educate, teach and inspire for generations to come. UNESCO’s founders believed that we could create peace and prosperity by preserving our cultural history and heritage, so I urge the Government to keep investing in our history. After all, a country that preserves its past is better placed to shape its future.