Music Education: State Schools

Lord Black of Brentwood Excerpts

Tuesday 24th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Black of Brentwood (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as chairman of the Royal College of Music, of which the noble Baroness, Lady Debbonaire, is a distinguished alumna. We have had countless debates on this subject over the years. Each time another comes along I feel a growing sense of frustration—indeed anger—because, for all the fine words, we never seem to make progress. It did not make me popular with my colleagues at the time, but I was very critical of the previous Government for their failure to act to secure better music education in state schools.

As music should be a bipartisan issue, I hoped that, with the change in Government, we would finally see some progress. But it is a year on from the election and still nothing has changed: no progress on post-Brexit visa issues, the curriculum, funding, or the long-term financial sustainability of the hubs and the music and dance scheme, both of which are forced to exist from hand to mouth.

Because this inaction has been going on for so long, there is now a real danger of terminal damage to the entire music ecosystem, which depends totally on the ability of talented young musicians to be able to progress from their earliest years to the start of their careers. It is a complex and intensive pipeline which depends on music and singing in primary schools, the easy availability of peripatetic teaching, professional music teachers, entry to a conservatoire or university with dedicated but intensive one-to-one teaching, and then career opportunities. It cannot be left to chance. It needs understanding from government and a co-ordinated, strategic approach.

At the moment, we do not have that, as government is not joined up, with policy spread across at least four departments. No one is in charge and there is no coherent, functioning national plan. That must change and quickly. We need someone to take overall responsibility. We need to establish long-term commitments to and sustainable funding of the hubs and the MDS. We need action on the curriculum and we need to make music an attractive profession for young people to enter, which means sorting out touring visas and ensuring we have a proper copyright regime in place to tackle the threat of AI. I hope that next time we have a debate there will be meaningful progress on all these issues.