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The British Red Cross Museum and Archives embraces the story of the organisation’s humanitarian work, with a collection dating from its beginnings in 1870 to its vital contribution to today’s society.

Alasdair Brooks says the external expert has been “hugely valuable”, focusing particularly on environmental issues relating to flooding and pollution from nearby, and recommending a next-stage collections audit, ultimately enabling improvements in collections care procedures.

The Red Cross Museum is developing an application to the Heritage Lottery Fund to employ a full-time collections auditor to recommend a range of measures to improve knowledge and use of its heritage assets. One area of concern was the need to certify that landmines in the collection were free from explosives.

Following the AIM audit, the museum applied to the Heritage Lottery Fund for a larger-scale three-year collections survey and although that was unsuccessful they were invited to resubmit and were expecting to hear in summer 2018. If successful, staff will be employed to begin work in the autumn.