165/01 8 May 2001

Working Group Will Consider Potential Return by Museums of Human Remains, Says Howarth 

Members of group and terms of reference announced

Members of the working group on the potential return of human remains and the group's terms of reference were announced today in the House of Commons by Arts Minister Alan Howarth in response to a PQ from John Healey MP (Wentworth).

The working group will:

• examine the current legal status of human remains in Government funded museums and galleries in the UK;
• consider how the law might be changed to allow museums and galleries to repatriate remains if they so wish;
• consider guidance on the care and safe keeping of human remains and on the handling of requests for return.

The decision to set up the working group follows recommendations made in a report on Cultural Property: Return and Illicit Trade, by the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport published in July 2000.

The Membership of the Group will be:

Chairman : Professor Norman Palmer, Professor of Commercial Law, University College, London

• Mr Tristram Besterman Director, Manchester University Museum, Convener, Museums Association Ethics Committee
• Dr Neil Chalmers Director, The Natural History Museum
• Dr Maurice Davies Deputy Director, Museums Association
• Professor Caroline Forder Professor of European Family Law, University of Maastricht.
• Mrs Hetty Gleave Solicitor, Hunters, Chair ArtResolve
• Dr Sally MacDonald Manager, Petrie Museum of Egyptian Archaeology, University College London
• Dr John Mack Senior Keeper, British Museum
• Professor Sir Peter Morris Nuffield Professor of Surgery at the University of Oxford and President-elect of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.
• Dr Laura Peers Lecturer in Ethnology and Curator of Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford
• Professor Marilyn Strathern Department of Social Anthropology, University of Cambridge

The Group will also invite evidence, either oral or written, from interested parties.

Notes to editors

The Terms of Reference for the Group are set out below.
The Government intends that the Group should start work as soon as possible.

Terms of Reference for Working Group on the Potential Return of Human Remains

• To examine the current legal status of human remains within the collections of publicly funded Museums and Galleries in the United Kingdom.

• To examine the powers of museums and galleries governed by statute to deaccession, or otherwise release from their possession, human remains within their collections and to consider the desirability and possible form of legislative change in this area.

• To consider the circumstances in which material other than, but associated with, human remains might properly be included within any proposed legislative change in respect of human remains.

• To take advice from interested parties as necessary.

• Consider the desirability of a Statement of Principles (and supporting guidance) relating to the care and safe keeping of human remains and to the handling of requests for return. If the Panel considers appropriate, to draw up the terms of such a Statement and guidance.

• To prepare a report for the Minister for the Arts and make recommendations as to proposals which might form the basis for a consultation document (to be used for consultation under the Regulatory Reform Bill).