Official Statistics

Total income of DCMS-funded cultural organisations 2021/22: headline release

Published 8 March 2023

Applies to England

1. Details

Released: 8 March 2023

Next release : 2023/2024

Geographic Coverage: England

Responsible statistician: Kamila Verikaite

DCMS directly funds 19 cultural organisations via Grant in Aid. These include Arts Council England and their National Portfolio Organisations, the British Film Institute, British Library, Historic England and the 15 DCMS-sponsored museums and galleries.

Income figures for the Victoria & Albert (V&A) museum in Dundee are not collected as the site is operated as a separate charity to the main V&A museum group. As such, its figures are excluded from this publication and data set.

The data for this report covers income for these organisations up to the 2021/22 financial year (April 2021 to March 2022).

Analysis of visitor numbers during this period has shown an increase in visits to DCMS-sponsored museums and galleries in 2021/22 compared to the previous year 2020/21, yet still a low figure compared to 2018/19 (the latest financial year completely unaffected by the pandemic). Caution is advised when making year on year comparisons due to the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic, and associated restrictions and support packages that may have affected the different income figures.

2. Headline findings

2.1 Summary

In 2021/22, the total income of DCMS-funded cultural organisations was £4.1 billion, lower than £4.2 billion in 2020/21 but higher than £3.6 billion in 2018/19 (the last financial year unaffected by the Covid-19 pandemic). Adjusting for inflation, this was a 2.2% decrease compared to 2020/21 and a 4.9% increase compared to 2018/19.

Figure 1: Total income breakdown for DCMS-funded cultural institutions over time, 2018/19 to 2021/22.

See Glossary for the definition of each income type.

2.2 Grant-in-Aid

In 2021/22, DCMS-funded cultural organisations received a total of £1.7 billion in Grant-in-Aid. This is a decrease of 6.2% from 2020/21, after adjusting for inflation. However this is a 50.4% increase, after adjusting for inflation, since 2018/19, the last year unaffected by the coronavirus pandemic. These trends are largely driven by a  substantial increase in 2020/21, particularly to Arts Council England as part of the Culture Recovery Fund, which then tapered off slightly in 2021/22.

The DCMS-funded cultural organisations have a variety of funding models, reflecting their diversity of size, type and purpose. The proportion of Grant-in-Aid to total income ranged from 18.4% to 99.7% across the cultural organisations in 2021/22. However, the average proportion of Grant-in-Aid to total income over all institutions was 42.0%, a decrease from 43.9% in 2020/21 and an increase from 29.3% in 2018/19 (the last financial year unaffected by Covid-19), reflecting enhanced levels of government funding throughout the pandemic as mentioned above.

2.3 Fundraising income (charitable giving, excluding donated objects)

In 2021/22, DCMS-funded cultural organisations generated a total of £413.3 million through fundraising income (excluding donated objects). This is a real term increase of 12.3% from 2020/21 and an increase of 6.8% from 2018/19 which is the last financial year unaffected by Covid-19.

The proportion of fundraising income to total income ranged from 0.0% to 36.0% across DCMS-funded cultural organisations. The overall average was 10.2%, a rise from 9.7% in 2020/21 and a fall from 12.2% in 2018/19.

2.4 Fundraising income (donated objects)

In 2021/22, DCMS-funded cultural organisations collectively received £47.7 million in the form of donated objects, an increase of 58.6% from the previous year after adjusting for inflation and 16.6% from 2018/19 (the last financial year unaffected by the Covid-19 pandemic).

The proportion of income from donated objects to total income in 2021/22 ranged from 0.0% to 15.9% across the cultural organisations. The average over all the institutions was 1.2%, a rise from 0.8% in 2020/21 and from 1.1% in 2018/19.

The value of donated objects varies considerably over time, and between institutions. In the case of some organisations, a one off ‘star’ donation can dramatically increase this figure, whereas a few organisations do not, or rarely, receive donated objects. Caution should therefore be taken when making comparisons.

2.5 Fundraising income ratio to Grant-in-Aid

This section shows the ratio of fundraising income to Grant-in-Aid. Excluding donated objects, in 2021/22 this was 24.2%; that is to say, for every £1 of Grant-in-Aid DCMS-funded cultural organisations received in 2021/22, they generated an additional 24.2 pence of fundraising income (note that this does not include income the organisations make from trading, investment income or admission fees, for example). This total is:

• higher than in 2020/21 (22.0p fundraising generated per £1 Grant-in-Aid received)
• lower than in 2018/19 (41.6p fundraising generated per £1 Grant-in-Aid received).

Recalculating these figures to account for donated objects (i.e. all fundraising income), the estimates show that the ratio of total fundraising income to total Grant-in-Aid was 27.0%, meaning that for every £1 of Grant-in-Aid DCMS-funded cultural organisations received in 2021/22, they generated an additional 27 pence in fundraising income (again, this does not include income the organisations make from trading, investment income or admission fees, for example). This total is:

• higher than in 2020/21 (23.8p fundraising income generated per £1 in Grant-in-Aid received)
• lower than in 2018/19 (45.2p fundraising income per £1 in Grant-in-Aid).

Figure 2: Ratio of total fundraising income to total Grant-in-Aid trend over years 2018/19 to 2021/22.

2.6 Other income

In 2021/22, DCMS-funded cultural organisations generated a total of £1.8 billion through other activities such as trading, investment income and admission fees. This is a decrease of 2.5% from 2020/21, after adjusting for inflation. This is also a real term decrease of 18.5% from 2018/19, the last financial year unaffected by Covid-19.

The proportion of other income to total income ranges from 0.0% to 66.5% across cultural organisations.

The average proportion of other income across the cultural institutions was 46.6% of total income, a rise from 45.7% in 2020/21 and a fall from 57.4% in 2018/19.

3. Data sources

The data presented in this report is collected from the DCMS-funded cultural organisations annual reports and accounts apart Grant-in-Aid, which comes from the DCMS Annual Reports and Accounts.

Data for the Arts Council England’s National Portfolio Organisations (NPOs) (formerly known as Regularly Funded Organisations, RFOs) is based on the NPO annual survey. The Arts Council England provides funding through Grant-in-Aid and National Lottery to a portfolio of organisations which includes museums, libraries and arts organisations. The latest figures reported are from the annual survey of the 828 organisations that will be funded from April 2018 to March 2022 by Arts Council England.

4. Glossary

4.1 Grant-in-Aid

Grant-in-Aid is money provided by central government departments to arms-length bodies in support of the general objectives of the organisation. It does not include other public funding, for example the DCMS/Wolfson Museums and Galleries Improvement fund or the National Lottery Heritage fund

4.2 Fundraising income (charitable giving)

Fundraising income (charitable giving) does not include any money received from a publicly funded organisation, central government grants, investment income or lottery grant funding. It is defined as any money or gift received from an individual, charity or private company in one of the following forms:

• Donations, legacies, bequests and similar income
• Donated objects (also identified separately)
• Sponsorship
• Donations from connected charities + other donations
• Capital grants and donations (not from public bodies)
• Membership schemes

4.3 Other income

Other income is constituted of any other forms of income not included in the definitions for fundraising income and Grant-in-Aid. This is summarised as:

• Trading income
• Investment income
• Admissions & exhibition fees
• Development funds
• Activities for generating funds

5. Annex A: Technical Note

This statistics release is an Official Statistic and has been produced to the high professional standards set out in the Code of Practice for Statistics. For more information, see the Code of Practice for Statistics

On 1st April 2015, English Heritage split into two organisations: Historic England and English Heritage Trust. Comparisons between 2015/16 or 2016/17 and other years are therefore not possible. As of 2017/18 Historic England’s fundraising income reached a level that is comparable with those of other funded cultural organisations and is therefore now included in the report.

The following cultural organisations do not have values for donated objects. This is because:

• The Museum of the Home accepts donated objects which fit within the collecting policy of the museum. Objects which have a value of over £1,000 are added to the museum’s collection and accounts, however such occasions have been rare since accounting records began.

• The Sir John Soane’s Museum receives donated objects on rare occasions and no financial value is ascribed to these in the Museum’s accounts.

• The founding bequest for the Wallace Collection prevents the museum from adding donated objects to their collection.