---

Heritage

My hon. Friend if he starts barracking like that. I should like to concentrate on our cathedrals. The evidence given by the Association of English Cathedrals and by individuals such as Michael Coupe shows that our cathedrals are in considerable difficulties. If one needed reminding of that, I had it only yesterday in a letter from the Dean of Southwark, writing not only as Dean, but as a representative of English cathedrals. He said:"““The Department for Culture, Media & Sport’s response was really very weak. If we continue on the present track, our great ecclesiastical buildings will revert to the parlous state they were in fifteen years ago and most will have lost their choirs and their schools (I do not merely refer to choir schools). in view of the incredible achievements of the past fifteen years, that will be extremely sad. I give two illustrations. Last year, by their own determination and voluntary efforts, cathedrals raised over eleven times the finance English Heritage was able to grant for conservation work alone, quite apart from all the other work we undertook and enabled. We accommodated over 600,000 school children of all faiths on educational visits. That degree of energy and commitment seems barely recognised, or worse, that the government is literally banking upon it.””" The Minister has a special knowledge of cathedrals. He was a chorister in Peterborough at the cathedral used in that splendid BBC adaptation as Barchester cathedral. He knows at first hand how crucial our cathedrals are in so many ways, and about the importance and tradition of cathedral music. A cathedral without its music is like a cathedral without its stained glass windows, or a cathedral without its fine misericords, if it has them. A cathedral is an entity, and that entity includes cathedral music. That the Dean of the cathedral from which Her Majesty gave her Christmas broadcast last year should feel moved to write in those terms is serious and significant. I hope that the Minister will stiffen his sinews so that the Treasury can soften its heart, and that he will argue powerfully and passionately, as only someone who truly knows our cathedrals can argue, for a proper apportionment of funds. To starve those, our greatest public buildings, of the resources necessary to maintain them is an act of cultural vandalism fit to rank with the dissolution of the monasteries 500 years ago. We do not want to be the generation that put our cathedrals into decline. When the Minister argues, as I am sure he will, he must point out that as we sit here today, our two great metropolitan cathedrals of Canterbury and York are between them appealing for more than £70 million. Canterbury needs £50 million; York needs £23 million, much of it to restore that incomparable glass. My cathedral of Lichfield is about to launch a major appeal for the Herkenrode glass, some of the finest glass in this country. It was brought over to this country at the time of the French revolution from an abbey that was despoiled on the continent. We shall need upwards of £15 million for that, and any country which allowed such great monuments to fall into decay and decline would not deserve to be called a civilised country. My hon. Friend the Member for Maldon and East Chelmsford, in his admirable report, enabled us to raise these issues and for that I am grateful. I would like to touch briefly on some other matters. However much we excite people’s passions about our great historic buildings, and however much we may persuade a parsimonious Treasury to stump up, unless we are able to encourage young people to consider the crafts as careers of great excitement, we will not be successful. I have been privileged for the past 20 years to run a scheme called William Morris craft fellowships on behalf of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings. Every year, we give fellowships to three, four or five young craftsmen or women—and many of them have been women—in a whole range of disciplines because we are conscious that we will not be able to preserve our great built heritage, either secular or spiritual, unless there is an adequate supply of craftsmen. There will be a meeting in Westminster at the end of next month between my all-party group on arts and heritage and the all-party group on construction skills and training to focus the attention of hon. Members on this issue. I hope that the Minister will talk to his colleagues in the Department for Education and Skills and in the Department of Trade and Industry to find out what we can do to make young men and women feel that there is nothing more wonderfully rewarding than a successful career in the crafts. After all, we rightly celebrate our great architects, but how often do we celebrate the craftsmen who translated their vision into glorious reality? I urge the Minister to focus on this issue, and as a fellow Select Committee Chairman, I say to my hon. Friend that I hope his Committee might feel it is worthy of a detailed inquiry at some stage. Where are these young people coming from, where are they being trained and what can be done to excite more of them? As we approach the Olympics we are talking about exciting young people on the sporting field—that is good. I am all for that. However, if were able to make people feel that there is worthwhile and lasting career in the crafts, it would redound to our credit. I finish by mentioning the Olympics again. I wish the Olympic games to be a great success—of course I do. I have my apprehensions about transport in London and all the rest of it, but we have set our hands to that plough and we have to make sure that we deliver. But a great and prosperous country, which is what we are, that delivers a finely organised and presented Olympic games, as I am sure we will, at the expense of the things touched on in this report would not deserve to be regarded as a great and prosperous country. That is our challenge. Sadly, because of the peculiar nature of the Minister’s Department, it is his challenge, and I hope that he will rise to it.