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National Lotteries Bill

I absolutely agree. This whole area of concern puts the finger on something that has always bedevilled politicians and Governments in their support for the arts and for heritage. The public are asked the perfectly understandable rhetorical populist question of whether they would prefer to help people who are dying and have huge ““help”” problems, or to help our young get a good education, or to buy works of art for a gallery, works of archaeology or objects. Almost everybody, of course—no matter how passionate a supporter of the arts and our cultural heritage—would ask how one could possibly resist supporting people in severe ill health or who need better education. But it is not a proper question—it is a fake question, and one that should not be asked. In any civilised society, we need both: of course we need good health care and education, but we need great art galleries to express what this generation cares about and to pass that on to our children and grandchildren. The danger of the Bill—and to the lottery, which has been, in our lifetime, the one bulwark against that populist question—is that undermining that bulwark by general drift will leave us all poorer. The lottery may, as a result of the Bill and the Government’s action, do very good work in health and social inclusion programmes, and in the Olympics and sport. However, our children and our grandchildren will ask what it was that this generation cared about in our cultural life and how they can see it when they go to our major galleries and museums. They will ask what we collected and what we wanted to do, and there will be a terrible, gaping hole. Virtually no contemporary fine art is being collected in this country. One of the few bodies that supports it—the Contemporary Art Society—has minuscule programmes and a tiny handful of money every year. In 50 years’ time, we shall be in danger of their looking back at our generation and saying that we cared so little for our arts and heritage and cultural life that nothing remains that there is a gaping hole in our museums and galleries. [Interruption.] Does the hon. Member for Chatham and Aylesford (Jonathan Shaw) want to intervene?