UK museum staff shortages threaten core missions, survey finds

A new survey of 329 UK museum directors reveals that staff shortages have overtaken building maintenance as the top concern. The Museum Directors Research 2026, published by Art Fund and conducted by Wafer Hadley between January and March 2026, shows 85% of directors cite team size as the main barrier to programming, compared to 67% for budget constraints and 23% for lack of specialized expertise. Rising national minimum wage has forced institutions to prioritize pay for lower-paid roles, sacrificing raises for senior staff and specialists. Local authority funding cuts or cessation affected 45% of institutions between 2024-2025 and 2025-2026. Over a third of museums have reduced or plan to reduce opening hours and annual exhibitions. Visitor numbers rose for 44% of institutions in 2025-2026, down from 57% in 2024, while a fifth saw declines. In Northern Ireland, one local authority museum has had a permanent recruitment embargo for eleven years, leaving only five staff out of a theoretical twenty. A Welsh local museum lost all specialist posts, retaining only a director and an assistant curator who also handles marketing. The National Gallery in London launched a voluntary redundancy plan in February 2026 for its 500 employees to address a projected deficit of £8.2 million. The Museum of Cambridge cut a third of its staff and now opens four days a week instead of six. The transfer of Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust to the National Trust eliminated 47 of 184 positions.