Why is it important that a “national” museum have the type?

Sorry to return to this question, it’s not that I have an issue with it but it is an interesting one.
One reason why it is important that it is in a national museum is that they are partly funded by the government aswel as donations/entrance fees, therefore we have an interest in them and what they do.
A museum that has a clear remit to exhibit British military aircraft should look after what they already have if it fills that remit.
Most surviving Shackletons (if not all, bar WR960?) are privately owned by individuals and displayed at private museums, at the end of the day the owner can do what they like with their exhibits (thankfully they invest a lot of hard earned dosh and time), the IWM has a bit more of a public mission to work within.

I agree… other examples being the Cosford MR2, and the Strathallan T4 as examples of the last of a variant being scrapped. I’d love to see a Shackleton either rubbing shoulders with the Lincoln at Cosford, or filling the gap between Lancaster, York and Vulcan at Duxford. Sadly, I don’t think it will happen though.

I cant help but think – what is it relevant to in the IWM collection? There’s no Nimrod there, and precious little else to do with postwar Coastal Command/Maritime work.

Exactly and that illustrates how fragile some of our historic aircraft are, it doesn’t take an awful lot for one type to beome almost extinct, though I hope the Gatwick situation won’t change drastically and the Newark example seems very safe.

Rich, What is it relevant to, well I would see your statement the other way around, because it is the only aircraft in the IWM collection to represent post-war Coastal Command then it should be kept as their one token to the hard work and losses of this once important RAF command.
The IWM has a remit to cover the history of the British military since WWI, both in war and peacetime, here is a type that they have on their premises that actually dropped bombs and fired guns in anger and yet feel they can’t either store or restore.

Cosford’s Hastings was a MET.1 in a earlier life, used by 202 Sqn part of Coastal Command.

Yes aware of that Richard, TG517 at Newark was a MET.1 aswel (think most T.5s were), however it takes some aviation knowledge to look at those two aircraft in their present bomber training configuration and think of them as Coastal Command aircraft. They served in a secondary non combative role(though very important!) unlike the front-line Shack.

Coastal Command itself is woefully under represented in the national museums anyway, getting rid of a type that served Coastal from 1951, through to the disbandment of the command in 1969, and on for another coulple of years seems like a huge backward step to me.