Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, what recent steps her Department has taken to ensure the fair allocation of arts funding in (a) Great Yarmouth, (b) other coastal communities and (c) the UK.

Arts Council England (ACE), which distributes public funding at arm’s length from the Government, is committed to supporting arts and culture across the whole country, including coastal communities. To this end, ACE has recently announced the outcome of its 2023–26 Investment Programme, which will be investing £446 million each year in arts and culture across England. Organisations right across the country are facing challenges, and it is right that support from the taxpayer is fairly distributed. This funding will now support 990 organisations – a record number – across the whole of England and will give people across the country, including those in coastal communities, more opportunities to access high-quality culture on their doorstep.

ACE and DCMS jointly identified 109 Levelling Up for Culture Places – places which historically have had low investment in arts and culture or lower levels of participation – which will be targeted for additional Arts Council England investment. These places include a number of coastal communities such as the Isle of Wight, Great Yarmouth, Torbay, and Barrow-in-Furness.

Between 2020 and 2023, across all programmes Arts Council England has allocated almost £2.3 million of lottery and exchequer funding to Great Yarmouth – including support for The Seachange Trust. Arts Council England recently announced that The Seachange Trust in Great Yarmouth will now receive an increased level of funding, totalling over £1.7 million over the next three years as part of the 2023–26 Investment Programme.