Charles Dickens: Bicentenary

Baroness Rawlings Excerpts

Thursday 9th February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Norwood Green]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what plans they have to celebrate the bicentenary of the birth of Charles Dickens.

[Baroness Rawlings]

My Lords, Her Majesty’s Government are always delighted to fund and support different institutions and events celebrating the life and work of Charles Dickens, not only in this bicentenary year but at any time. This year includes special programmes with the BBC, the British Council and a number of our museums such as the V&A—there are so many that I dare not recite them all in these few minutes.

[Lord Young of Norwood Green]

I thank the Minister for her reply. I must admit that I was hoping for a more imaginative response from DCMS, but I know these are hard times. I did not have great expectations. I suggest that a Dickens day in schools would not be a bad idea. I, too, pay tribute to the BBC, which has given us great value for money recently in both TV and radio adaptations. There are also the Royal Mail’s commemorative stamps. I was privileged to attend the Abbey ceremony. I am not sure that Dickens would have thought that particularly appropriate, but I hope the Minister will join me in paying tribute to Dickens’s role, including as a great parliamentary reporter. He reported on the Great Reform Bill of 1831. I am not sure what he would have thought of the Welfare Reform Bill. This would be a bleak House if we did not put on record our acknowledgement and tribute to Dickens as one of our greatest writers.

[Baroness Rawlings]

My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Young of Norwood Green, was clever to have put down this Question this week in the 200th year of Dickens’s birth. I know that the noble Lord is a Dickens aficionado—as we have heard. DCMS is delighted with any new ideas, especially by examples as inspired as the noble Lord’s suggestions. Of course we join in the tribute to Dickens as a great reporter. Some noble Lords may have read that the Secretary of State gave a Dickens novel to each Member of the Cabinet on Tuesday. Where possible, the book was linked to their ministerial brief. I thought that was a wonderful idea and one very close to my heart.

[A noble Lord]

Did the Prime Minister get Bleak House?

[Baroness Rawlings]

He got Great Expectations. I urge all noble Lords in the Chamber to consider something similar for family and friends.

[Baroness Royall of Blaisdon]

My Lords, did the noble Lord the Leader of the House get Bleak House?

[Baroness Rawlings]

He did.

[Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville]

My Lords, Mr Twemlow in Our Mutual Friend expressed his opinion that the House of Commons was “the best club in London”. Will my noble friend consider instituting a prize for the best contemporary Dickensian description of your Lordships’ House?

[Baroness Rawlings]

My noble friend Lord Brooke always comes up with original ideas. I am sure that everything will be fed in to the department.

[The Lord Bishop of Chester]

My Lords, which Member of the Cabinet got A Tale of Two Cities?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Rawlings]

I am afraid that I do not know.

[Baroness Bonham-Carter of Yarnbury]

My Lords, Dickens referred to this House when he was a reporter here as,

“a conglomeration of noise and confusion”.

It probably continues to be so. As Matthew Parris wrote, the culture of our country is its heartbeat. Who more exemplifies that than Charles Dickens? Can the Minister confirm that the cultural education review due to be published this month will call for a national plan for cultural education and that the coalition Government will celebrate Dickens’s bicentenary by putting into practice the teaching of creativity at the heart of the educational curriculum?

[Baroness Rawlings]

My Lords, my noble friend Lady Bonham-Carter brings up a very good point. We are committed to encouraging wider reading. I am sure that we will include in the culture education review that is about to come out the various points that she brought up. The Secretary of State for Education has talked frequently about the importance of encouraging children to read books. It is often said that those who read well-written books usually achieve better standards. Dare I quote from Dickens, as everyone has done?

“No one who can read, ever looks at a book, even unopened on a shelf, like one who cannot”.

That is from Our Mutual Friend.

[Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall]

My Lords, would the Minister agree with me that the film and television industries, which have developed in the past 100 years, would have been pretty stuck for content, had it not been for the works of Charles Dickens? Would she encourage her ministerial colleagues to put some pressure on BAFTA to nominate Charles Dickens for a posthumous fellowship?

[Baroness Rawlings]

My Lords, I am sure that that is a good idea, but I have a feeling that BAFTA is probably an independent body. We will put that forward, and hope that BAFTA reads the noble Baroness’s suggestion in Hansard.

[Lord Harrison]

My Lords—

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, does the Minister recall that I raised the issue with her a few weeks ago that, in this Diamond Jubilee year, it would be appropriate for a gift of a Dickens novel to be given to children throughout the country? When I subsequently wrote to her and had a brief conversation, she said that she would look at ways of trying to promote private sponsorship of such a project. Has she been able to make any progress in that regard?

[Baroness Rawlings]

I have not actually heard back recently from DCMS on that very interesting suggestion, but I will write to the noble Lord on it.