Arts

Lord Murphy of Torfaen Excerpts

Thursday 1st February 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Murphy of Torfaen (Lab)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to take part in what has been a great debate. I particularly welcome my noble friend Lord Bragg’s powerful and penetratingly relevant speech on the arts today. He referred, quite rightly, to the chaos caused by the former Culture Secretary and Arts Council England to the English National Opera.

I will refer to opera outside London, which has equally been affected by the decision of the Arts Council to reduce funding. The Arts Council was given 9% more funding in the last settlement but has cut opera by 22%. The effect in England and Wales, outside London, is on touring opera. My noble friend Lord Rooker referred to Mid Wales Opera and the work that it does. I want to refer to just three companies, because that is all we have, in England and Wales which deal with touring opera: Glyndebourne, Opera North and—inevitably—the Welsh National Opera. Despite its name, the Welsh National Opera does a great deal of work in England and a big part of its funding comes from the English funding council as well as the Arts Council of Wales. As a consequence of those cuts, we have seen cuts in performances.

On the touring aspect of opera, those three companies go to 13 cities in England, including Plymouth, Hull, Newcastle, Bristol, Southampton, Birmingham, Oxford, Milton Keynes, Canterbury, Nottingham, Liverpool and Manchester. In all of those cities, we have now seen a reduction in performances. The year before last there were 146 performances, but now there are 87; 10 years ago, there were 250 performances throughout England and Wales outside London. The figures speak for themselves. Take two continental European countries as a comparison: in Germany, there are 78 companies, and in France, there are 17 companies. You can go through all the countries in Europe, and the Scandinavian countries, and find that they serve their people better in opera than we do.

If we make opera less accessible, with performances reduced and production ceasing in various parts of the country, we will make it elitist. But it should not be; it should be for everybody. As a consequence of that decision by Arts Council England, we are in dire trouble, and touring opera in England and Wales now faces a crisis. It is the opposite of levelling up.

I hope that the Minister will refer to my remarks in his wind-up. I ask him two things. First, I ask him to liaise with his counterpart in the Welsh Government to ensure that the Welsh National Opera receives proper funding. Secondly, before Arts Council England’s next funding round—I think it is in three years—and to save opera in our country, I ask for this crisis to be dealt with directly and not left in the hands of Arts Council England, which is not doing opera any good at all.