More than £250,000 has been saved in staff costs as the National Media Museum tries to safeguard its future after visitor numbers halved in a decade from a peak of a million.

Museum bosses started a consultation in October and have revealed that nine staff members have taken voluntary redundancy.

It is unclear which exact departments they worked in or what their roles were, but there has been a re-organisation within the collections, public programme, communications, design and learning departments.

Jo Quinton-Tulloch, the head of the National Media Museum, said that direct changes had been made to 35 roles in this phase.

“So far 23 members of staff have been retained in existing positions, new roles and elsewhere within the Science Museum Group,” she said.

“Nine members of staff have opted to take voluntary redundancy and a further four roles are yet to be filled. Please be aware that the wider review is still ongoing but this initial phase is due to be completed by the end of January.

“This is a very difficult time for all our staff and it is with regret that we will lose a number of colleagues.

“We do not anticipate any compulsory redundancies in this phase and despite the ongoing requirement to save money I am confident these changes will enable the National Media Museum to deliver a revitalised visitor offer, a more varied programme and focus on the use, research and development of the core collections.”

The news of the voluntary redundancies comes after the Telegraph & Argus reported earlier this month that moving archives, reviewing jobs and cutting fixed costs were all part of the spending review.

The T&A revealed in October that the museum had to slash costs after it was found that it spends 30 per cent more per visitor than other museums in the Science Museum group which includes the Science Museum, Museum of Science and Industry, National Railway Museum (York) and the National Railway Museum (Shildon).

The plan now is to get Bradford in line with the other venues, but the museum has not revealed what the actual spend per head is, or how much the budget is or what it could be reduced to.

The spending review was designed to enable it to “spend less on fixed costs and more on exhibitions, galleries and events”.