Museum and heritage assistant jobs in councils

Council museum and heritage assistants look after visitors and collections at museums, art galleries, historic houses, archives and heritage sites run by local authorities. Most posts are front of house: staffing the reception and shop, keeping an eye on the galleries, answering questions and opening and closing the building. Others lean towards collections care, learning sessions for schools or events. Pay for council-employed staff is set on the NJC pay spine, which starts at £25,614 a year full time for 2026/27, and a large share of the jobs are part-time, casual or weekend only.

Front of house and visitor services

Visitor services assistants deal with the public. On a typical shift you open the building, check the galleries and fire routes, take admissions or donations, run the till in the shop or café, and patrol the galleries. Gallery work means watching over objects and visitors at once: stopping people touching fragile items, helping a family find the toilets, explaining how a display works, and spotting anything that looks wrong.

There is routine work too: checking toilets and restocking leaflets. School groups arrive early, and a fire alarm or a lost child needs a calm response. Many sites expect front of house staff to deliver short talks or handling sessions once trained, and to help set up evening events or exhibitions.

Weekend and bank holiday working is normal, since those are the busiest days. Some posts are school holiday only. Rotas usually include early and late shifts around opening times.

Collections and learning roles

Collections assistants work behind the scenes with the objects themselves. Tasks include cataloguing items on the collections database, packing and moving objects, monitoring light, temperature and humidity in stores and galleries, checking for pests, and preparing objects for loans and exhibitions. You work under a curator or collections officer and follow the museum’s documentation procedures closely, because every object movement has to be recorded.

Learning or engagement assistants run workshops for schools and families, prepare handling boxes and support outreach work in the community. Experience with children and a DBS check at the level the post requires are standard for these roles.

At small council sites one assistant may do all of this in a single week. At larger services the roles are separate, with their own job descriptions and grades.

Who employs you

Councils run museums directly or through other bodies. The main arrangements are:

• a council culture or leisure department running museums directly, where you are a council employee on Green Book terms
• a charitable trust set up by the council to run museums, libraries or leisure, with its own employment terms
• a partnership or joint service shared between several councils
• a heritage site where the council owns the building but a separate charity runs it

When a council moves a service into a trust, existing staff usually transfer under TUPE and keep their terms. New starters are often on the trust’s own scales. TUPE: when your employer changes explains what transfers. Check the advert for the name of the employer, because your pension and leave arrangements depend on it.

Many council museums are accredited under the national Museum Accreditation Scheme run by Arts Council England, which sets standards for collections care and visitor services. Staff at accredited museums can expect formal procedures for documentation and object handling.

Pay, hours and contracts

For council employees, grades are built on the NJC pay spine. After the 3.3 per cent award from 1 April 2026, the bottom point, SCP 3, is £25,614 full time, about £13.28 an hour. Front of house grades often sit near the bottom of the spine. As an illustration, a grade covering SCP 3 to SCP 5 would pay £25,614 to £26,427 full time. Collections and learning posts are often a grade or two higher. A part-time or weekend post is paid pro rata; what pro rata salary means shows how to work out the actual figure.

Trusts and charities set their own rates. They must pay at least the National Living Wage of £12.71 an hour for workers aged 21 and over from 1 April 2026, with £10.85 for 18 to 20 year olds and £8.00 for under 18s. Some are accredited Real Living Wage employers, where the voluntary UK rate announced on 15 October 2026 is £14.10 an hour, or £15.45 in London.

Casual and zero-hours contracts are common for event and holiday cover. Exclusivity clauses in zero-hours contracts are unenforceable, so you can work elsewhere as well. Zero-hours contracts covers your rights.

Council employees join the Local Government Pension Scheme. On pay up to £18,400 the main section rate is 5.5 per cent, and from £18,401 to £29,000 it is 5.8 per cent. Green Book leave is at least 23 days plus 8 public holidays and 2 extra-statutory days, pro rata for part-time staff.

Getting in and moving up

Front of house posts mostly ask for customer service experience, reliability, and an interest in history, art or the local area. Retail, hospitality and tourism experience transfers well. Volunteering at a museum, archive or heritage site is the most common way to build relevant experience, and some council services recruit paid staff from their volunteer teams. Volunteering to get experience covers how to make it count on an application.

Progression into curatorial or collections management roles is competitive. Many curators hold a degree in a relevant subject and a postgraduate museum studies qualification, though some councils run traineeships or apprenticeships that lead into collections work without one. Moving from front of house into a collections assistant post, then into an officer role, is a realistic route within a larger service.

There is no single national site for these vacancies; where councils advertise jobs lists the main portals. Compare the library assistant profile if you are also open to other council cultural services, since the skills and grades overlap.