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Creative Industries

My Lords, I join in thanking the noble Lord, Lord Bragg, for securing this debate. The number and variety of speeches today are an indication of how central the contribution of the creative industries is to the UK economy and also, I argue, to the well-being of the UK. As Sting pointed out at the Hay festival, while the country does not produce much any more, ""we do make art and music"." He is so right. As I have said before, in an era which has seen manufacturing jobs halved since 1997, the creative sector is the new economy. As I think the noble Lord, Lord Watson, mentioned, it has been estimated that music alone contributes £5 billion to the UK economy. Many noble Lords have mentioned festivals today—we have heard about Wales and Edinburgh—and I feel that I have to speak up for the south. I went from Hay to the Wylye Valley art trail, a nine-day celebration of the visual arts in and around the Wylye Valley where I live. It was an opportunity to visit artists’ studios, see the range of artwork being carried out in the area and to meet and talk to artists and craftspeople. Up the road, the Salisbury festival has for the past two weeks been host to music, dance, theatre, workshops and even, I believe, the noble Lord, Lord Bragg. It not just about art, music and theatre; the range and diversity of the creative industries, as the noble Baroness, Lady Young, pointed out, stretches from fashion to film, advertising, architecture, television and video games. The cultural and creative industries make up 7.3 per cent of the national economy, contributing £60 billion a year and collectively employing 2 million people. We believe that that should be a key route to getting us out of the recession. But we must keep ahead of the game. The UK is lagging behind in the deployment of super-fast broadband. The Government’s commitment in the interim Digital Britain report to a rollout of two megabytes per second, when the average is already 3.6 megabytes per second, is not nearly ambitious enough and will not provide the catalyst for recovery that is required. One of the greatest threats to the growth of this sector, as mentioned by the noble Lords, Lord Corbett and Lord Macdonald, is the knotty problem of the protection of intellectual property rights in our digital age and the ease with which copyright can be and is, flouted via online piracy and peer-to-peer file sharing. The report, to which the noble Lord, Lord Corbett, referred, Strategic Advisory Board for Intellectual Property stated that around 7 million people in the UK are involved in illegal downloads, costing the economy tens of billions of pounds. Of course, this behaviour spans from those involved in intentional online piracy to many who are uncertain about what is illegal. The fact that so much on the internet is free confuses people. A new settlement is needed between artists, consumers, rights-holders and intermediaries, with copyright at its core. Good copyright protection is vital for the encouragement of creativity and the health of the creative sector. The Government’s interim Digital Britain report acknowledges the importance of creative capital. However, its suggestion of a digital rights agency without statutory powers seems to offer little hope of ending the problem. A collective approach from internet service providers, rights-holders and government is needed to make it more likely for court cases such as that brought against the founders of Pirate Bay to succeed. Moves by the ISPs to send warning letters to repeat offenders are welcome and evidence suggests that they would have a good chance of making a difference. However, we do not think that the "three strikes and you are out" policy being considered in France is a desirable solution. ISPs cannot be both judge and jury. It is to be welcomed that part of the remit of the proposed rights agency is, according to the noble Lord, Lord Young, in a recent debate on online piracy, ""to focus on encouraging respect for the creative industries and increasing public awareness of the easiest way to access legal content".—[Official Report, 2/4/09; col. 1224.]" I think that we would all agree about the need for education alongside regulation. We must not forget that we are talking about the creative world—a fast-moving, dynamic world that the explosion of digital content has nurtured. Alongside the need to find a solution to online piracy, we need to exercise proportion—cultivate without crushing, as the noble Lord, Lord Bragg, said. But the new world brings with it problems for the old. Broadcasting has historically made a hugely important contribution to the British creative economy. I declare an interest as an associate of an independent production company. The inspired creation of the BBC—followed by ITV, BBC2 and then Channel 4—has played a crucial role in sustaining and fuelling British creativity. More recently, changes in TV terms of trade have seen remarkable growth in the independent production sector. As well as nurturing British talent and British content, radio and television channels have provided virtually free access to all across the creative spectrum. But as the noble Lord, Lord Macdonald and the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, said, British broadcasting has reached a critical point. A transition is under way. Competition from digital channels and the internet has led to a decline in advertising revenue for the commercial public service broadcasters, which is exacerbated by our being in recession. The funding model, which has seen an annual investment of £3 billion in UK-originated content is under severe threat. However, the statistic that is most relevant is this: the five terrestrial channels—those that are universally available and free—are responsible for about 90 per cent of the investment in UK-originated content; whereas the new players—the digital channels and the internet—contribute less than 10 per cent. That is despite the fact that together they receive two-thirds of the income coming into UK TV. The British creative industries need our public service broadcasters and we must protect the BBC licence fee from topslicing and suggestions of arbitrary freezing, as made recently by the Conservative Party. According to an independent report commissioned by the BBC Trust last year, the BBC’s activities put £5 billion per annum into the creative industries. We must not return to the days when the BBC was a monopoly. We welcome the Government’s commitment in the interim report of the noble Lord, Lord Carter, Digital Britain, to maintaining a plurality of public service broadcasters. Can the Minister confirm that the Government support the idea of a partnership between Channel 4 and the BBC’s commercial arm Worldwide? As a publisher-broadcaster, Channel 4 makes an enormous contribution to the creative economy. It stimulates competition in the UK’s creative economy and it is vital that it survives. A snapshot of the creative industries can be seen in the new manufacturing industries and the phenomenon of Harry Potter. The films are made at a place called Leavesden aerodrome, where Rolls-Royce used to manufacture helicopter engines. Now instead of that kind of industry, it employs vast numbers of people from across the creative spectrum from the most advanced new media to practitioners of crafts in the shape of carpenters, painters, actors, and so on. But for this, there needs to be a skills base, and that starts with education. Creativity needs to be nurtured from the, beginning, as the noble Lords, Lord Puttnam and Lord Inglewood, mentioned. Yet creative skills are stifled in our schools by a system that is dominated by exams and league tables. With the rejection of the Tomlinson report, the national curriculum continues to undervalue vocational qualifications. Creativity needs status, which has been recognised across the Atlantic by President Obama, who has committed to reinvest in arts education. He said: ""In addition to giving our children the science and math skills they need to compete in the new global context, we should also encourage the ability to think creatively that comes from a meaningful arts education."" Will the Government follow his lead? In their Creative Britain paper, the Government committed to establishing 5,000 apprenticeships annually in the creative industries by 2013. There is no money ring-fenced. Instead, the commitment turns out to be raising the awareness of employers of the benefits of apprenticeships. In other words, the commitment is to a concept, and so far I believe that only 50 places have been provided. The Chancellor said in his Budget speech that job creation and employment for people of all skill levels would be vital to long-term recovery. The Government should be investing in these apprenticeships. The creative industries are a key to economic recovery. Two years ago, the cultural sector got together and published a manifesto called Values and Visions. I end with its words that, ""Britain’s economic prosperity will not depend on industrial prowess, natural resources or cheap labour but on developing, attracting, retaining and mobilising creativity. In this 21st century, goods, services and industries driven by knowledge and creativity will define Britain’s competitive edge"."