Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Debate between Baroness Harris of Richmond and Baroness Scott of Bybrook

Committee stage
Wednesday 15th March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

No, it is a power for the Secretary of State.

The amendment seeks to remove the power of the Secretary of State to make consequential amendments to such legislation. The effect would be that the Secretary of State could still apply police and crime commissioner legislation in relation to a combined county authority mayor or chief constable but could not make any necessary consequential amendments to reflect a change of circumstances. This limitation is undesirable and would result in flawed and inconsistent legislation in this area.

Finally, I will address the issues raised by the noble Baroness on Clause 38. This clause allows the Secretary of State to make regulations applying legislation that relates to a police and crime commissioner to a combined county authority mayor or a chief constable where the combined county authority mayor has adopted the single-employer model. Removing the clause would hinder the effective full implementation of the single-employer model because it would mean that the Secretary of State could not make further regulations applying local policing enactments or new corresponding provisions in relation to mayors of combined county authorities who have implemented the model.

I hope that my explanation will reassure the noble Baroness and the noble Lord of the importance of this group of clauses to the effective conferral of fire and rescue functions on combined county authority mayors, specifically on those opting to use the single-employer model to exercise these functions, and will therefore enable her to withdraw her opposition to them standing part of the Bill.

[Baroness Harris of Richmond (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her comments. All the clauses stand together, so I need to read Hansard carefully and go through her comments on each clause. I believe there was some contradiction in what she said, so it is important that I am quite clear going forward that I have understood absolutely what has been said this afternoon. I thank all noble Lords who have spoken. I will withdraw my opposition at this point to the clauses standing part, but we will come back to this on Report.

Creative Sector

Debate between Baroness Harris of Richmond and Baroness Scott of Bybrook

Thursday 4th November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Harris of Richmond (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I too thank my noble friend for introducing this important debate so brilliantly and comprehensively. I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Spencer, on his fascinating maiden speech and welcome him to this House, even virtually.

I want to tell noble Lords about the impact that the pandemic and government policies have had on the creative industries in a small rural town. Like many small communities up and down the country, you will find a wealth of remarkable cultural and creative activities in my beautiful market town of Richmond at the top of the Yorkshire Dales. We have dozens of groups that our citizens can join, from choirs and orchestras to writers’ groups, painters, potters, sewers and dancers—all tastes are catered for. It is remarkable to me that a town of only 8,500 should have so many creative people wanting to express themselves in so many diverse ways.

In particular we have our internationally famous Georgian Theatre Royal, a grade 1 listed building built in 1788, the oldest working theatre in its original form in the UK. Knowing that we had this debate today, I wanted to know how the theatre had fared during this terrible time and, interestingly, it has fared pretty well. Having been given a hugely generous donation from a marvellous benefactor, it was beautifully restored during lockdown, which enabled it then to open once restrictions on theatres had been lifted. During lockdown, though, it was helped by the Culture Recovery Fund, for which we were enormously grateful. That paid around £78,000 for items such as maintenance, insurance and utilities. Then of course there was the job retention scheme, which paid the salaries of the small number of people employed at the theatre, which, by the way, has only 155 seats. In a way, if there were to be a good time for the theatre to be closed, one could say that this was it. However, without the help from the recovery fund and the furlough scheme, it might well have been a very different story.

However, it is not all roses. Most venues, all over the country, may have survived, but actually putting on a production is much more problematic. Because they received little help with their finances, many smaller venues have had to close permanently. Certainly, small production companies like the ones used by our theatre in Richmond have found it extremely difficult to get started again because of the uncertainty of getting money in. Shows take time to be stage-ready, and artists simply have not had the help that others have had, leading to a real shortage of shows to put on in our theatre. Indeed, the chief executive tells me that it has been almost impossible to produce a good programme because of the inability to get people together to rehearse. This is the fault, without doubt, of the Government’s leaving this sector without any help whatsoever during the pandemic.

Small theatres need to be paid up front now because insurance is problematic and going up, as we have heard. There is understandable nervousness about getting people back into theatres. Will they make enough profit to stay open? Even an historically significant theatre like ours has these deep concerns, so what assurance can the Minister give to them? For instance, will the Government ensure that the theatre and orchestra tax relief scheme will continue to support the many small theatres and orchestras into the future, because it will be a long time before they can make any profit?

It seems to me that this is all about confidence: confidence in our Government to do the right thing and begin to support our cultural heritage. This sector was so cruelly treated during the pandemic by not supporting artists and performers—the very people we need to help our creative industries grow. We also need to find the confidence to return to pre-pandemic levels of support for those individual performers and groups, who bring such richness to our daily lives.

That means allowing overseas artists to perform here as well. At the moment, we have made it extremely difficult for them to do so, as we have heard, and our home-grown performers are finding it almost impossible to get bookings in Europe because of the ridiculous paperwork they now need to complete. What was once easy has been made ludicrously difficult because of our stance on Brexit. So, finally, will the Government begin to see how important it is for us to share our culture with the world and recognise that only by unfettered reciprocal arrangements between countries can we begin to rebuild our creative industries?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, I remind noble Lords that there is a six-minute limit on speeches from Back-Benchers, and it will take time from the response from the Minister if we keep going over.