Local Government Finance Act 1988 (Prescription of Non-Domestic Rating Multipliers) (England) Regulations 2026

Debate between Lord Faulkner of Worcester and Earl of Clancarty

Tuesday 10th February 2026 Grand Committee

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Faulkner of Worcester) (Lab)]

It might be helpful to the Committee if I explain that we are considering only the first Motion on the agenda at this time. I shall call the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, to move his Motion when we have concluded this debate. We are debating them both, but we can take only one at a time. The one that we are taking now is the first Motion from the noble Lord, Lord Livermore, but the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, has been in order by speaking to his Motion, because it has been grouped with the government Motion.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, I am very pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, has called this debate, which is so important for the arts. He has summarised the arguments extremely well. I am grateful, too, to the noble Lord, Lord Livermore, for his introduction.

I am grateful for the briefings from both the Music Producers Guild and UK Music. I am particularly grateful for the conversation I had last week with Gaby Grafftey-Smith, who runs the prestigious Angelic Studios in Northamptonshire. Angelic was founded by musician Toby Smith of Jamiroquai—

“by a musician for musicians”,

as its website eloquently puts it. Since 2017, when Toby Smith sadly died, the studio has been run by Gaby. One of the first things that she told me was that no one runs a studio to make money; they do so out of a passion for music. It is less a business and much more a vocation. The artists and technicians themselves build up the heritage. A studio develops organically in a creative manner. In terms of business, the margins are tight, as the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, said, and there is a ceiling on income, because only so many artists can be booked. The space itself often has to be for the desired sound, which may be created by choirs or a grand piano—a big space.

It is also precious. Gaby talks about the precise mix of cultural and technical specification that make up her recording studio and others. Trust is built up over time between the studio recording engineer and artist. Each recording studio will have a different character and a different sound; they are all individual. She told me about a drummer for a well-known band, who, having tried different studios across the country, has said that her studio is the only one that provides the right environment for the particular sound that the drummer is trying to achieve.

Angelic is also one of a few key residential studios, which further cements the crucial relationship between artist and studio. In particular, for major stars such as Harry Styles or Black Sabbath, it means, as Gaby puts it,

“a unique, rural, isolated space to work”.

If such artists cannot find such spaces in the UK, we will lose these stars to America. By their very nature, they are not spaces where public access is appropriate, but, as the noble Lord, Lord Clement-Jones, said, they can nevertheless be used by anyone.

Like other studios, Angelic also has an apprenticeship scheme, but Gaby points out that, if recording studios cannot afford to take on those who are learning what is a key craft in the music recording industry, those who come into the industry in the future are much more likely to be from a moneyed background. That is an effect that the Government ought to think hard about. The major effect would of course be on the artists themselves, with artists turning to studios in other countries, such as in New York or Paris, in the event of studios closing or booking charges increasing. Just as worrying is the possibility that new British artists would not get a rung on the ladder or be able to record in a professional environment alongside established musicians.

Like all recording studios, Angelic is extremely worried about the increase in business rates. The Music Producers Guild reports that, for Angelic, that increase would be 48%—slightly higher than the average predicted increase of 45%, itself a massive increase. On business rates, Gaby believes that, for the reasons that I have laid out, studios should have their own category and be linked to yearly turnover, rather than a square-footage rateable value. I have described the character of one recording studio to show how much creative effort goes into the provision of one important specialist facility that cannot be expected to grow and diversify like an ordinary office-based business—it grows in a different way.

It ought to be pointed out here that Abbey Road, with its mixed portfolio, is, for obvious reasons, an outlier. Abbey Road is far and away the most famous recording studios in the world and a tourist attraction, so identified is it globally with the Beatles—although, of course, those studios also have a remarkable classical legacy that stretches back to Elgar, as the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley of Knighton, will well know.

I hope that this debate will make it very clear how much our recording studios are as much critical creative infrastructure for the music industry as film studios are for the film industry. Yet film studios receive 40% relief on business rates without, of course, needing any public access. The loss of a single recording studio would be tragic, but the loss of possibly up to half of our recording studios would be catastrophic—a tragedy that would be writ large on the music industry.

Employment Rights Bill

Debate between Lord Faulkner of Worcester and Earl of Clancarty

Report stage
Monday 21st July 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Faulkner of Worcester (Lab)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay, for making an excellent speech which I could very easily have made myself—there was nothing in it with which I disagreed. He rightly referred to the fact that he and I tabled an identical amendment in Committee. We have come back tonight because this issue really has to be settled one way or another. I have previously declared my interest as president of the Heritage Railway Association. I should also say that I am the sponsor each year of an HRA award for young volunteers, to encourage a continued influx of young people to learn the skills and enjoy the satisfaction that working on a steam railway brings.

Last month, in my role as president of the HRA and co-chair of the All-Party Group on Heritage Rail, I was fortunate enough to take part in the 70th anniversary celebrations of the Ffestiniog Railway in north Wales, which was brilliantly organised and fitted in admirably with National Rail’s Railway 200 programme. It involved a cavalcade of every steam locomotive that the railway possesses, in procession on the Cob in Porthmadog, and it was a very fine tribute to the railway’s history and its contribution to the economy of north Wales. I met many young people who are keen to join the railway but are prevented from doing so because of their age, and I took the opportunity also to talk to older volunteers who are now part of the very successful team on the Ffestiniog. Almost without exception, those older volunteers started at ages as young as 13, back in the 1970s, in blissful ignorance of the Employment of Women, Young Persons, and Children Act 1920—an Act which, frankly, had disappeared from public consciousness. Indeed, many were involved in the hard physical labour of building the deviation that some of your Lordships may know, which allowed the railway to be carried above the waterline of a new reservoir to reach the northern terminus of Blaenau Ffestiniog.

As the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, said, once the HRA received the wholly unwelcome advice that the 1920 Act had been interpreted to extend to under-16s and included volunteering as well as paid work, things changed. The safety regulators have made it clear that they would not prosecute under the 1920 Act and would maintain safety and safeguarding under more recent and appropriate legislation; but if that is so, I have to ask why this anachronistic legislation is still on the statute book.

I am most grateful to the Minister, my noble friend Lord Katz, for the discussions he initiated with the noble Lord, Lord Parkinson, and me on this, and I know how sympathetic he is to the points we have been making. I understand that the possibility of further guidance from the safety regulators remains, but that guidance must be reinforced by statutory force, because while the 1920 Act is in force, responsible Heritage Railway managers will not wish to break it. Even if the ORR would not prosecute, what is to stop a local authority or a parent doing so? It is time to make things clear and simple by removing this outdated restriction that is holding heritage railways back from encouraging the next generation, preventing them enjoying the opportunities that so many leading figures in the railway heritage movement had as youngsters.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, I will be exceedingly brief. I put my name to this amendment in the spirit of support for our heritage, of which our heritage railways are a significant part. We need to do everything we can to allow young people who wish to do so to work as volunteers in this area. I hope that the Government will look favourably on this amendment.

Local Government (Religious etc. Observances) Bill

Debate between Lord Faulkner of Worcester and Earl of Clancarty

Friday 13th March 2015 Lords Chamber

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Faulkner of Worcester) (Lab)]

My Lords, I must advise the Committee that if this amendment is agreed to, I shall not be able to call Amendments 7 or 8 for reasons of pre-emption.

[The Earl of Clancarty]

My Lords, I have little against the contents of proposed new Section 138B. I think I am probably with the majority of the country who would like to see council prayers dropped but would defend a council having an involvement in religion as a significant aspect, if one aspect, of the life of the borough.

At Second Reading, the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, mentioned Lewisham Council’s involvement in acts of remembrance and in Holocaust Memorial Day. Of course, one can think of many other examples of events of a religious or part religious nature. I have no problems with any of this. As I say, the great majority of the country would not object to—indeed, might insist on—such involvement. None of this is at risk.

My quibble is with the word “support”, which over eggs it. Impartiality is the key. My concern is that this proposed new section is not necessary. There is something slightly peculiar about having this alongside council prayers in the same Bill. They are entirely different matters, and I think that the public can make that distinction.