CONTROVERSIAL plans to charge York residents to enter the city's art gallery have been put on hold.


City of York Council's Learning and Culture Policy and Scrutiny Committee decided to defer a decision on the £7.50 admission fee and were backed by Cllr Nigel Ayre, the authority's executive member for Culture, Leisure and Tourism.


He will now look again at the plans and make a fresh decision in September.


Six campaigners spoke passionately against the charges and called for them to be scrapped in time for York Art Gallery's official opening on Saturday.


Don Phillips, a resident from Heworth, said: "Fees are now attached to almost everything we wish to do.


"The facilities are getting rarer and more expensive and what is more frustrating is another area of solace is being blocked."


Charlotte Dawson set up a petition against the charges, which already has around 800 signatures.
"I was really looking forward to taking my two nieces to the gallery when it re-opened and I feel really gutted about this," she added.


"This feels really out of touch with the community."


Cllr Julie Gunnell added: "This proposal is of considerable concern to those of us who believe arts and culture should be easily accessible."


However, it was committee members Cllr Janet Looker and Cllr Stephen Fenton who proposed the decision be postponed after it emerged nobody from the last administration's cabinet had discussed the implications of cuts to York Art Gallery's funding.


Cllr Looker said: "Within cabinet we did not have any discussion either formally or informally around the funding cut.


"We knew it had been put forward because it was in the budget.  The ways in which this would be managed did not come to us.


"I really don't think we have serious options in front of us today and I would urge the executive member to postpone."


York Art Gallery is run by the York Museums Trust, which has seen its subsidy from City of York Council cut by 60 per cent or almost £1 million since 2012.


Janet Barnes, chief executive of York Museum Trust, told the meeting the charges had to be introduced because of the cut backs.


She added: "We are not doing this because we want to.


"We were the people who made the art gallery free to enter in 2002 because the council had been charging an entry fee before then.


"We are doing this because we need that funding to cover the cost of managing the performance of museums and buildings we were given by the council to look after."