Benefits of tax
From Dr Peter Mandler Sir: In writing about the current spate of works of art threatened with export, Susan Moore (New ways to keep Old Masters', 17 May) mourns 'the decline in the kind of national sentiment' that once motivated the owners of great works of art to sell them to national collections in preference to foreign buyers. In the same article, however, she points out that family trusts — very often the holders of such works — are required to sell them to the highest bidder. That has always been true. The problem is therefore not the decline in national sentiment but the decline in material incentive to sell to the national collections, The only effective control on art export this country has ever had has been the high rate of inheritance tax, from which great works of art were exempt until sold. In those circumstances, vendors didn't reap much profit if they sold abroad, but if they sold to a national collection, some of the tax was forgiven (the 'douceur') and the vendor kept more of the proceeds. Thus family trusts were more or less pushed into selling to the nation.
One of the unappreciated effects of the Thatcher-era tax cuts is that the douceur offers a much-reduced incentive, and Britain is left without any effective controls on the export of works of art. Government needs to put its mind urgently to this problem, or sad stories such as Susan Moore's will be appearing weekly.
Peter Mandler Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge
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