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Arts

My Lords, I add my thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Bragg, for initiating this debate and for his truly intellectual speech. Like the noble Lord, Lord Young, only a few hours ago I was listening to the noble Lord speak with great erudition on the subject of fairies. I think we can all agree that he is a true renaissance man. Despite the greatness of this country’s artistic heritage and endeavours, as so many noble Lords have talked about today, the subject is somehow a poor relation in the arena of political debate. That is wrong. President Kennedy was right to say—here I am glad to say I shall quote a different remark from that used by the noble Lord, Lord Smith of Finsbury—that:"““The life of the arts, far from being an interruption, a distraction in the life of the nation, is very close to the center of a nation’s civilization””." Across the centuries, the arts have thrived in this nation, gloriously surviving a Puritan interregnum. The works of creativity produced by Shakespeare, the Beatles, Margot Fonteyn, Charles Dickens, the noble Baroness, Lady Rendell, Zadie Smith and Alan Bennett—whose play ““The History Boys”” is receiving standing ovations on Broadway at every performance as we speak—belong to us all. They help to define our nation and enhance it; they engender feelings of well-being through their very existence. Nowadays as well, as the noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, said, there is film, television, design and electronic games. In an era in which manufacturing jobs have halved since 1997, the creative sector is the new economy. Real value nowadays is in the design, not the manufacture. Intangible assets are increasingly important. There is no difference between a pencil and a piece of music, in that their value is in the idea. Indeed, I would argue that the creative industries are virtually the only form of manufacturing left in this country—and yet creativity is still not given the status it deserves despite the fact that these industries are now a key economic driver. I was interested that the new Minister for creative industries, Shaun Woodward, recognised this fact on taking up his new job this week. Creativity needs to be nurtured from the beginning, but too low a profile is given to the arts in education. The national curriculum continues to hold up maths, history and science as the more valuable subjects. Of course they are incredibly important—we need historians and we need scientists—but we also need a better balance. Creativity is at the heart of everything we do and should be given equal time and credit. A shockingly high number of those who are our most successful artists—the ones whom I have come across, anyway—in whatever field, are those who found art a refuge. They are where they are in spite of school, not because of it. This is the wrong way around. It is also important to recognise that working professionally in the arts is not an easy option. We should engage artists in society in a more productive manner. We should encourage schemes that utilise under-employed artists in prisons, as the noble Lord, Lord Ramsbotham, said, in schools and in hospitals. So we welcome the Government’s Creative Partnerships scheme, which sends artists into schools to work with teachers and pupils, crucially across the whole curriculum. Ninety per cent of the teachers involved have found that this has improved their ability to help young people to reach their full potential. I cannot think of a greater endorsement than young people reaching their full potential—art contributing to the well-being of society—but funding is guaranteed only until 2008. Can the Minister reassure us that this is not a scheme that will wither on the bough because of a lack of money? Britain has historically recognised—returning to the words of JFK—that the arts are very close to a nation’s civilisation. In 1753 the British Museum was created, the first national museum in the world. It was free of charge and its intent—a revolutionary notion for its time—was, in the words of the museum’s director, Neil MacGregor,"““to allow visitors to address through objects, both ancient and more recent, questions of contemporary politics and international relations. It was a product of the Enlightenment—a conviction that knowledge and understanding were indispensable ingredients of civil society—and the best remedies against the forces of intolerance and bigotry that lead to conflict, oppression and war””." An institution such as the British Museum is more important than ever in our world today. The cultural historian Edward Said, a man I was lucky enough to meet, wrote before he recently died, in words which echo the mission of the 18th century creators of the museum, that,"““we need to concentrate on the slow working together of cultures that overlap, borrow from each other and live together””." Last Thursday, the British National Party greatly increased its representation peddling its warped fantasy of the return to some mythical racially pure Britain. Our national museum contributes to the debunking of this appalling misinterpretation of British history and identity, and to the understanding of the multicultural mixture we have always been and which so enriches the creative life of the nation. Thanks to the Government—and, in particular, the noble Lord, Lord Smith—having introduced free admission to DCMS-sponsored museums and galleries, so many more people are able to benefit from the enlightenment as well as the pleasure they offer. This in turn benefits society. I have to say in parentheses, however, that it is still the case that troves of treasure languish in basements, cupboards and locked rooms. How about loaning them out to schools and hospitals—and, indeed, even to shopping centres—in order to take art to the people? Like so many other noble Lords who have spoken, I welcome the increased funding the arts have received since Labour came to power. The money has, on the whole, proved to be well spent, so why have the Government frozen the Arts Council’s budget for three years? If inflation is taken into account, this will mean a real terms cut in funding from 2006–07. This has been described as a ““betrayal”” by a former DCMS special adviser and has been strongly criticised by, among others, the chairman of the Arts Council and the director of the Royal National Theatre, Nicholas Hytner. The national under Hytner has been both innovative and successful. It aspires to reflect the diversity of our culture, to encourage the creation of new work as well as staging the classics, and to broaden audiences. For the second year running there has been a £10 Travelex season, which saw 94 per cent attendance. It was a welcome attempt at providing theatre-goers with the free access offered by museums and galleries, and it has not come out of extra public subsidy. I think Nicholas Hytner is a man to whom the Government should listen, as well, of course, as the former Secretary of State we heard from earlier today. Our galleries are already struggling. Tate Modern—one of the most popular art galleries in the world—has been forced to beg artists such as Damien Hirst and David Hockney to donate work it can no longer afford. The National Gallery now has to rely on a private bequest it received in 1985 as its only major source of acquisition funding—a bequest given to enhance, not replace, government support. As well as unfreezing the Art Council’s budget there needs to be more progress on restoring the independence of the lottery distributors from government. Lottery money must not be used as a replacement for government spending as has happened in the past, with money that should have gone to the arts being spent on projects such as free fruit for schoolchildren. That is very laudable in its own right, but it should be paid for by the Government. We must value the arts and artists for their own sake as well as for the benefits they bring to other areas of life. The way in which the Government fund the arts, whereby money given has to tick various boxes, makes the arts industry rather target driven, which can sit uncomfortably with creative endeavour. As someone whose career outside politics has been in television, I cannot make a speech on the contribution of the arts without mentioning, as have the noble Lords, Lord Bragg and Lord Haskel, the contribution of broadcasting. The inspired creation of the BBC, leading to ITV and then Channel 4, has played a crucial role in sustaining and fuelling British creativity. Here, again, the noble Lord, Lord Bragg, must be congratulated on so successfully championing the cause of the arts, not only in this House but on commercial television. As well as nurturing the arts, these radio and television channels have provided virtually free access for all across the creative spectrum. This is very precious. At least one of the noble Lords sitting on the government Front Bench will know what I am about to say, which is that free-to-air access must be protected in the digital age and the PSB channels should not be made to pay for spectrum. Finally, the first chairman of what was to become the Arts Council, that great Liberal, John Maynard Keynes, who sat on these Benches—although they are rather empty today, I am afraid, as many noble Lords who wished to take part in the debate were unable to do so—described its purpose in a radio broadcast in 1946. It was,"““to create an environment, to breed a spirit, to cultivate an opinion, to offer a stimulus to such purpose that the artist and the public can each sustain and live on the other in that union which has occasionally existed in the past at the great ages of a communal civilised life””." I think this debate has shown that across the House we still embrace this aspiration.