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The National Gallery on Trafalgar Square in London. Photograph by Mike Peel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license.

Staff at London’s National Gallery strike over job cuts

Tom Hoepf
Tom Hoepf
The National Gallery on Trafalgar Square in London. Photograph by Mike Peel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license.
The National Gallery on Trafalgar Square in London. Photograph by Mike Peel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license.

LONDON (AFP) – Staff at London’s National Gallery will walk out for two hours on Thursday in a dispute over job cuts, but the gallery said it would try to keep a landmark exhibition of Leonardo da Vinci paintings open.

Members of the Public and Commercial Services Union are going on strike between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m. in protest at staff cuts, with a similar walkout planned for Jan. 28.

The union says a 15-percent cut in government funding, introduced as part of an austerity drive designed to reduce the deficit, has led to a reduction of assistant posts to the point where there is no longer one assistant per room.

PCS General Secretary Mark Serwotka said: “As well as hosting high-profile exhibitions like Da Vinci, the gallery is home to some incredibly valuable works of art, not just in monetary terms but in their contribution to culture and our society.

“But instead of investing in the arts, and the people who look after them, the government has imposed massive spending cuts on our museums and galleries to pay for an economic crisis caused by bankers.”

The National Gallery is currently hosting a major Da Vinci exhibition that brings nine of the Italian’s 15 surviving paintings together for the first time and is attracting more than 3,000 visitors each day.

“The National Gallery will endeavor to keep as many gallery rooms open as possible, prioritizing the ‘Leonardo da Vinci: Painter at the Court of Milan’ exhibition to fulfill its obligation to people who already have tickets for that day,” a gallery spokesman said.

He added that the staffing changes had been approved by security experts, and insisted that it was not unusual for galleries to use one assistant to monitor two rooms at a time.

ADDITIONAL IMAGE OF NOTE

The National Gallery on Trafalgar Square in London. Photograph by Mike Peel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license.
The National Gallery on Trafalgar Square in London. Photograph by Mike Peel. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license.