Abstract
In recent years the UK Government has advocated changes in the way that heritage assets are managed, in particular the extension of free access to museums and other heritage resources, with the purpose of encouraging socially excluded citizens to make greater use of these assets. This paper will draw on empirical evidence from Scotland and argue that it is far from clear whether the imposition / lack of entry charges plays a significant role in encouraging or discouraging the use of such assets and, may in fact amount to a subsidy to wealthy tourists, in an area where there is evidence to suggest that they themselves seem willing to pay. In the conclusions to the paper it will be noted that given the lack of clarity as to whether policy is having its desired effect, it may in fact be desirable that monies currently spent on integrating social inclusion and the management of heritage assets might better be disaggregated, re-allocated and spent on more focused policy activities in the following three fields: social inclusion; the conservation of the heritage resource base; and, the development of the tourism product.

Keywords: Public policy, tourism, heritage, social inclusion.

By David Silbergh, Peter K. Falconer