Town of Culture Award

Michael Ellis Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd January 2019 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (Michael Ellis)]

It is a real pleasure to close this debate, Mr McCabe. I thank the right hon. Member for Delyn (David Hanson) for securing it and all hon. Members present for their valuable contributions and advertisements for their towns or localities. I also thank those hon. Members who co-signed the letter to the Secretary of State asking that our Department establish a town of culture award.

I am thrilled with this debate, because it really is recognition of the value of culture generally, which we all know about; as Culture Minister, people would expect me to say that. I have been to 35 locations around the country in the past 12 months and seen the value of culture in towns, villages and cities alike, and how important it is for society as a whole.

I join colleagues in celebrating the rich heritage and culture of towns across the UK. I must confess to being possibly a little biased in favour of this motion, as my own constituency is in a town. Of course that town is the very best of towns—I was born and brought up there and it has its own very generous share of cultural heritage—so I recognise, first and foremost, the value of towns. Creativity, arts and heritage make our towns and all our places—cities included—unique, and our communities better places to live in. A Conservative colleague suggested recently that we should also have a county of culture. Culture goes across the board.

As the right hon. Member for Delyn has highlighted it, I will say something about the UK city of culture award, because it has a powerful social and economic impact on the winning bidders. Hull 2017, which has been alluded to, leveraged truly enormous private investment and generated £300 million through increased tourism alone.

I understand the potential for arts and culture to transform communities, which is why a range of places, including towns, can already enter the UK city of culture competition. Of course I recognise that towns will have a lot to compete against when they come up against cities in the same competition. The bidding process for the title of the 2021 UK city of culture, which was awarded to Coventry, invited bids from cities and towns, and it allowed partnership bids from two or more neighbouring cities or towns, or from a closely linked set of urban areas. That is one way of dealing with this issue.

It is for individual places to weigh the benefits of bidding, in terms of galvanising local partners and raising the profile of the place, compared with the costs of putting together a bid. I am currently reviewing the criteria for any future competitions and will continue to keep under careful consideration the offer to towns, as well as the burden of bidding. This debate has been very influential in that regard, so I again congratulate the right hon. Gentleman on securing it.

[Kevin Brennan]

It is welcome that the Minister is reviewing the competition criteria. When does he expect to report back on his conclusions?

[Michael Ellis]

The hon. Gentleman will be among the first to know. Of course, there are already a number of Government-wide initiatives to invest in our towns and high streets. I have only a few minutes left to highlight some of them; indeed, some have already been alluded to by hon. Members.

I am also keeping under careful consideration the effectiveness of different types of support to help towns and other places to prosper. Wider Government support for towns and high streets includes, of course, the future high streets fund, which is worth £675 million. It was announced in the autumn Budget to encourage vibrant town centres where people can live, shop and spend leisure time.

The prospectus for that fund was only published in December. It invites local authorities to submit expressions of interest for capital funding. There is a lot of money available, so I encourage hon. Members to invite their local authorities to take an interest in the fund and submit expressions of interest.

Of course, DCMS-related sectors contribute to successful and healthy high streets, and it is key that they do so. The Royal Society for Public Health report, “Health on the High Street: Running on Empty 2018”, found that residents of towns with healthy high streets live on average two and a half years longer, and that libraries, museums and galleries contribute to the healthiest high streets. Culture has a powerful health as well as wellbeing benefit, and has a positive cultural impact.

The Government’s plan for the high street also includes the creation of a high street taskforce in 2019 to support local leaders. The Government already run the Great British High Street awards, a hotly contested competition to find Britain’s best high street. Crickhowell was announced as the overall UK winner for 2018, and I was delighted to see St Giles Street in my town of Northampton win the category in 2015. Towns can win, and this competition enables towns to raise their profile and celebrate local efforts to create vibrant town centres that are loved by their communities.

[David Hanson]

Just before the Minister finishes, I want to try to tie him down. My right hon. Friend the Member for Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) has written to ask for a meeting with Members of Parliament to discuss this process further. Will he and the Secretary of State agree to attend the meeting?

[Michael Ellis]

I cannot speak for the Secretary of State, but I will agree to meet. We will set that up, and I am happy to do so.

My Department believes that place-based cultural investment should be a key part of the local growth strategy for all towns and cities in England. The cultural development fund, which has already been mentioned and was launched in 2018, is a £20 million competitive fund to support towns and cities to develop and implement transformative, cultural and creative growth plans. Just last week the Secretary of State announced the winners: Grimsby, Plymouth, the Thames estuary, Wakefield and Worcester.

Grimsby will receive £3.2 million to deliver a new programme of international events and public art to revive the town centre, provide a business support programme for local creative businesses, and create new production facilities in the town’s historic centre. The Thames estuary will receive £4.3 million. The cultural development fund and the UK city of culture projects are exemplars of local enterprise partnerships. We also welcome the innovation of local areas developing their own initiatives to celebrate local culture. For example, the Liverpool borough of culture and the London borough of culture are attempts to broaden the impacts of cultural titles and moments to areas beyond city centres.

I want to stick up for Arts Council England. Some 75% of its funding goes outside London—it is being distributed widely. We of course have to bear in mind that large centres of population are within cities, but my experience of Arts Council England is that it recognises that its role is to spread its resources around the country, which it is doing. Some 9.2 million people saw British Museum exhibitions and objects on show outside the museum in 2017-18, and more than 2,500 objects were loaned to 126 venues around the country.

A lot of work is already being done in this area. I am very happy to meet colleagues and interested partners to discuss the matter further, and I am keeping the situation under review. My Department and the Government recognise the value of culture. It is a precious part of our community life and has multiple assets and benefits. We will continue to support it.