Economy: Culture and the Arts

Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville Excerpts

Thursday 13th June 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville]

My Lords, the second debate this afternoon is a happy foil to the one that preceded it, and we owe that agreeable conjuncture to my noble friend Lady Wheatcroft, who was admirably equipped by experience and avocation to launch it successfully. The noble Lord, Lord Puttnam, has forgotten more about these subjects than I shall ever know. It is a privilege to follow him, and a privilege, too, for your Lordships’ House that he is participating in this debate. The only footnote I will add to his speech is that the Greek Government have just been economically obliged to take the Greek broadcasting society off air, which is an index of the scale of that country’s present difficulties.

Arts Council England—I declare an interest because its chief executive was once my admirable Principal Private Secretary—is one of the heroes of this narrative. It deserves great credit for its conduct these past three years: first, for the worthwhile and coherent challenge it set its clients in 2010 to justify its claims on necessarily reduced resources; secondly, for the innovative initiatives that it mounted to assist individuals who, and institutions which, have been confronted by new and testing dilemmas; and, thirdly, for the logic and good sense with which it negotiated the potential impasse in which it is asked to justify itself to public and paymasters alike, without losing its self-respect or the respect of others in the process.

I will make one particular point that I regard as important and that other noble Lords may not make. First, I will illustrate the paean I uttered about the Arts Council with some examples of the initiatives that I outlined. I am drawing on developments since the most recent arts debate in which I participated, in 2010. I am thinking, for example, of the creation of The Space in May 2012, and of the Creative Industry Finance scheme to aid struggling exponents and creative entrepreneurs with development loans of £5,000 to £25,000, repayable over a maximum of three years. I am thinking especially of the Creative employment programme and the £15 million invested in providing 6,500 apprenticeships and internships for 16 to 24 year-olds. I say “especially” because for a quarter of a century I was a trustee of the Wordsworth Trust in Grasmere. Its current chairman, the noble Lord, Lord Smith of Finsbury, will speak later in the debate. The trust used its physical estate and the benefits regime of the Thatcher years—my remark about benefits is a technical one, not a commendation—to allow a series of able graduates in the same kind of age group to prepare for careers in museums while acquiring practical skills in the ordinary, day-to-day functioning of the trust’s activities.

I am thinking of the Arts Council’s partnership with its colleagues in the Creative & Cultural Skills group. I am thinking of the Momentum Music Fund for 50 to 75 bands and artists, with £5,000 to £15,000 loans over two years, similarly managed by a partner music organisation. On a longer and perhaps more traditional timescale, I am thinking of the linkage of creative businesses to cultural organisations close by, so that hubs and clusters may be created. I am delighted by the continuing use of public money to explore the potential of new ideas as a form of creative R&D, and to sustain the seemingly unthinkable.

On the question of self-respect, I like the chief executive’s measured clarion call about the unique ability of arts and culture to fire our imaginations and inspire and entertain us through the contribution that culture makes to our quality of life. Of course, these forces go back much earlier, but it is worth reflecting that it is only just over a quarter of a millennium since Mirabeau coined the concept of—and thus the word—civilisation. What is deeply impressive, in the same breath, is the ability of those involved to afford us a utilitarian justification of the straightforward financial return earned on this programme that can be rendered to the economy without shame or embarrassment. The most recent CEBR report is rich in specific and illuminating detail, and is an anvil for further R&D.

The one question I want to ask the Minister is how the sector is getting on with the opportunity it spelt out for philanthropy back in 2010. There are outstanding instances, like the Royal Opera House, but there are other institutions already surprised by the less satisfactory marks they scored in the Arts Council examination three years ago, and which may not have yet properly remedied their rejection by fundraising themselves, whose success is its own reward in moral as well as financial terms. In another heritage field, the efforts of small parishes to raise the finance to restore their listed churches are a useful signpost towards this goal, which can astonish and invigorate the individual stakeholders who take part in it. Is there an area here, where the Arts Council can enlarge its positive and practical quiver, by helping to teach people how to raise money?

Finally, there is one particular point I wanted to single out. I have not myself lost sight of the phrase, “We’re all in this together”, although I appreciate that some other people have. There are still disciplines in which we can look the world fully in the eye, and the extension of their number lends support to the efforts of those in other similar disciplines. When I was in the private sector, I once had a client who always put his international offices on the continent in cities where there was a good opera house, not just for his own pleasure, but also for that of his employees. Put at its simplest, beyond the ordinary tourism statistics, those foreigners who might have the need to do business with us on other counts, are more likely to do so if our arts, like our fighting forces, are world class. In this regard, I was struck by the disproportionate participation in the recent global lists of world-class cultural institutions in the Times of ones that are very much British.

In the mean time, however, I will close with the dying words of that artist who excelled in portraiture and landscape, and sometimes in both, as in his picture of Mr and Mrs Andrews. Here are the dying words of Gainsborough:

“We are all going to heaven, and van Dyck is of the company”.