Opera

Viscount Chandos Excerpts

Tuesday 10th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Chandos (Lab)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Murphy of Torfaen has done a great service to this House, opera and WNO in securing this debate and introducing it so compellingly—a case of a good revival being a great substitute for a cancelled first run. Although I was fortunate enough to be brought up with opera from an early age—I went to Sadler’s Wells first when I was nine and to the first night of Sadler’s Wells at the Coliseum, before it became ENO, in 1968—it was a great performance of Verdi’s “Don Carlos” by WNO in Oxford when I was a student that had me really hooked, to use the phrase of the noble Lord, Lord Thomas.

Those of us who have become hooked on opera should recognise that it is not everyone’s cup of tea, but those who respond to this extraordinary four-dimensional art form come from every social, economic and demographic background, if they have had half a chance to experience it. The burgeoning country house opera scene does wonderful work and provides employment, on-stage and off, often for young singers, musicians and technicians. However, I cannot help feeling that there is a cost to this that the opera community should recognise—that the elitist image, which my noble friend Lord Murphy powerfully demolished, is inevitably reinforced by the pictures of an audience in evening dress on lawns, with champagne glass in hand. If you go to a performance of Opera North, where my noble friend the Minister was a member of the board, WNO, ENO or Scottish Opera, the audience looks very different from that. If you went to a performance at any time over the past 25 years by English Touring Opera in Hackney, York, Norwich, Durham, Sheffield, Buxton, Poole or Exeter, you would have seen work of extraordinary quality being enjoyed by people from all walks of life.

The noble Baroness, Lady Noakes, whose time as a fellow board member of ENO left me with deep respect and affection, is not known in your Lordships’ House for advocating fiscal profligacy. If she believes that additional funding is needed without delay for opera, my noble friend the Minister should listen. I also share her views of Arts Council England. The seeds of ENO’s recent problems were sown as long ago as when we were on the board together, 20 or more years ago. The board was perhaps not as robust as we should have been in challenging the Arts Council then.

When I look back at the ENO and opera more widely over the past 30 years, the Arts Council’s influence has often been baleful, and recent years have seen this only worsen. As I said in the debate that I was privileged to introduce two years ago following the national portfolio awards by the Arts Council, its inexplicable and damaging decisions were not confined to opera—there were the 100% cuts to Britten Sinfonia and the Donmar theatre as other examples. As I said in that debate, I am not persuaded that the arm’s-length principle any longer justifies the existence of a central Arts Council, but for as long as it does exist and holds the responsibilities that it does, its performance must improve, immediately and transformationally.

I was therefore dismayed to hear reports that the chair of the Arts Council, Sir Nicholas Serota, was going to be given an 18-month extension to his two terms—during which I can only say that he has run Rudolph Giuliani close in destroying a once strong personal reputation and in presiding over the terrible damage by the Arts Council to the performing arts. The culture of Arts Council England needs change now. Eighteen months from now, this Government will be halfway through their term. The arts generally, and opera in particular, need help now, and delay will be deeply damaging. Will my noble friend say whether she believes that the reappointment of Sir Nicholas would ensure that that help came? If not, will she assure the House that his reappointment will not happen?