HC Deb 18 May 1962 vol 659 cc1785-94

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Chichester-Clark.]

4.4 p.m.

Mr. Julian Snow (Lichfield and Tamworth)

I desire this afternoon to raise the question of the proposed cancellation by the Board of Trade of the grants to the Crafts Centre in London. This follows the exchange of Question and Answer in the House on 17th April, when the Minister who is to answer this afternoon refused, as I understood him, to reconsider the matter except that he would consider special provision in connection with the Design Centre. However, I wish to place on record that what I want to say now does not imply any sort of criticism of the work of the Design Centre. The original grant was given at the time of Sir Stafford Cripps in August, 1949, and, put very briefly, the purposes of the Crafts Centre were the protection of craftsmanship in its highest form, the improvement of industrial design and, in so far as design and craftsmanship can help, the encouragement of exports.

It will be desirable at this point to trace the history of the Crafts Centre because although, strictly speaking, it did not start until 1948 it has a very respectable history behind it. It was in 1888, largely inspired by William Morris, that there was formed in this country the Arts and Crafts Exhibition Society. As the years went by, other societies of a similar nature decided to combine, until in 1941, there was a series of discussions which brought into account not only the Society that I have mentioned but the Red Rose Guild of Craftsmen, the Wood Engraving Society, the Senefelder Club, which deals with the art of lithography, and the Society of Scribes and Illuminators.

The objects of the Crafts Centre, which I shall paraphrase as best I can, are as follows: first, to make the craftsman and his work accessible to the public; second, to enable the industrialist to contact designers easily; third, to establish the status of British crafts in the eyes of visitors from abroad; fourth, to raise the standard of work by example; fifth, to encourage experiments in design; sixth, to co-operate with the Council of Industrial Design and the Rural Industries Bureau and other similar bodies; and seventh, to assist education by the proper recruitment of teachers and lecturers.

This decision in principle by the Board of Trade is additionally somewhat shocking because by this action in discouraging the work of the Crafts Centre we are riding against the example given by other countries which have organisations of a comparable nature. These other organisations sometimes receive direct financial grant, but all receive Government recognition, encouragement and help. For instance, in Germany where there are three equivalent organisations there is the Deutscher Handwerk Institut, the Handwerks Kammertag and the West German Association of Arts and Crafts. In France there is the Chambre Des Metiers which works under the direct control of the French Ministry of Industry and Commerce. In Finland there is the Finnish Society of Crafts and Design. In Denmark, which has probably the best, or certainly one of the best, organisations of its type, there is the Den Permanente of Copenhagen, and in Switzerland there is the Schweizer Heimat Werk of Zurich.

I am very reluctant to argue this case purely on the economic grounds of the running of the Crafts Centre because, strictly speaking, I think that we should address ourselves to the encouragement of the craftsman, and craft in itself, in my view, is a very dubious economic proposition. It is something which adds to the wealth of the cultural life of the nation but it is not always easy to argue the economic aspect. Even so, in spite of a relatively poorly-placed sales point in London, the Crafts Centre over the years has, I understand, built up sales to a figure, although it is not an audited figure, of £14,000 last year, and the number of visitors last year amounted to 37,500 which was an increase of 7,500 over the previous year.

I do not think it is at all true to say that the work of the Crafts Centre conflicts in any way with the Design Centre or the Council of Industrial Design. Sometimes it is argued that craftsmen belong to the Design Centre. Many craftsmen do work through the Design Centre, and nothing I say now should be taken as criticising the standard of those craftsmen. However, what I do say—to use a military analogy in respect of some very unmilitary people—is that the Crafts Centre is rather like a staff college as opposed to a unit training group. The craftsmen of the Crafts Centre are really the people at the top of the tree and people whom we should in no way discourage.

The craftsmen of the Crafts Centre have an impressive record of work. For instance, in the new Coventry Cathedral, which is very much in the news now, no less than six craftsmen from the Crafts Centre designed and carried out work including a silver chalice and a paten, stained glass windows, and the staff and other silver appertaining to the bishopric. Even the Government have used craftsmen whose work has been organised, encouraged and stimulated through the Crafts Centre. For instance, the Minister of Education in his offices has a suite of Cuban mahogany furniture produced by Mr. Edward Barnsley. Our Embassy in Paris has engraved glassware designed by Mr. Stephen Rickard, also emanating from the Crafts Centre.

It is very important to understand that craftsmen and craftswomen are not highly regimented and sometimes not very sophisticated people. They work very much by themselves. They need some sort of loose co-ordination and a method of cross-fertilisation for their work since they live widely apart. This the Crafts Centre has successfully provided. Craftsmen need sympathetic understanding. A great deal of their work has resulted in the inspiration of industrial design, and they take risks which industry does not want to take in the inexpensive production of high quality finely finished work which only the individual can do. There is no question of expensive tooling-up. Sometimes, it is a work of love which eventually finds its place in the economy of the country.

To show how the mind of the craftsman works, I will quote from a letter I received recently from a lady—there is no harm in mentioning her name—Ursula Brock, who is, I suppose, the leading weaver of silk in this country. She says: There is one point from a craftsman's point of view, which might possibly be useful in some future argument. Having slogged away quietly at the actual producing of my particular craft a good deal, I am sure that, to be a good designer or an inspiring teacher of future designers, people must do the actual process of their own craft over prolonged lengths of time and not just be able to do it. So much designing is evolved during the actual process of making things, and by endless experimenting with the materials involved. It gives one's thoughts time to work while one's mind is on the right track, so to speak. If a craftsman is going to produce work in this way, he cannot afford not to have a market for it. There is, in my view, an overwhelming case here for the Government to use a second agency for the co-ordination of these very high-class craftsmen. The Crafts Centre has helped in other ways, as the hon. Gentleman knows. It has worked very hard to secure Government approval of the post-graduate training of craftsmen scheme, the scheme whereby high-quality craftsmen may bring into their workshops young, theoretically promising, craftsmen and craftswomen so that they may learn at first hand in the conditions of a craftsman's workshop.

The Crafts Centre has been in touch with the Government successfully in the past to secure tax remission for the work of craftsmen. These are matters which need to be carried out by somebody or some organisation which feels for craftsmen in this way. What does the craftsman contribute? There are 500 of these people attached to the Crafts Centre. Firstly, I would say that hand-made craft articles are strictly the corollary of industrial production. Secondly, he contributes to the training of the next generation of industrial designers. Thirdly, a craftsman has to have an intimate knowledge of materials. Fourthly—this is almost the essence of the matter—a craftsman must have some sort of ability and some sort of organisation behind him which will permit that experimentation in new forms, on which industry does not want to incur expense, can be done in these little shops all over the country.

I believe that it is true to say that the development of the commercial success of the fashionable furnishing and textile products of Scandinavia largely owes its post-war inspiration to the work of British craftsmen in this country. Those very Scandinavian countries themselves have shops, centres and sales points in this country, and it seems a poor thing to do to our own craftsmen that at this point the Government should consider over-rationalising the situation and abolishing the grant.

This is an important matter. The Government would be well-advised not to concentrate too much on one single agency. Whereas the Design Centre has been and is doing most excellent work, nevertheless there is room for direct stimulation and encouragement of the individual who can work more easily with a small organisation which in itself, at a time when the threat came to remove this grant, was thinking of improving its premises—and, I would hope myself, improving its commercial methods—and moving to a more popular place. I believe that there is some idea of going somewhere near the newly designed future layout of Piccadilly.

The only criticism that can be levied against it is possibly a lack of commercial inspiration or a lack of ingenuity in putting its goods over to the public. I think that was largely because it was starved of funds. The plan which it had in mind was I think wholly desirable in the pattern of our life, and I hope that the Minister will have further thoughts about this matter.

4.18 p.m.

Mr. Nicholas Ridley (Cirencester and Tewkesbury)

The hon. Member for Lichfield and Tamworth (Mr. Snow), supported my Bill earlier this afternoon and I very much want to support what he has just said about the Crafts Centre. I have not the time to reinforce his strong argument that the Centre is important and needs consideration, but I should like to mention the exports which craftsmen themselves have achieved. I know of one firm that has exported £16,000 worth of British crafts over the last ten years.

The point which I should like my hon. Friend to consider is that this is not only a question of whether there should be a grant of £5,000. I cannot comment on the technicalities of whether the Design Centre is a suitable home or not, but, somehow, he has the responsibility to ensure that the Crafts Centre survives its crisis and reappears in some other building or under some other name. I do not know what. It plays an import- ant part and I hope that my hon. Friend will make sure that it keeps its individuality and independence in any future reorganisation that he may succeed in bringing about.

4.20 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Board of Trade (Mr. Niall Macpherson)

The hon. Member for Lichfield and Tamworth (Mr. Snow), who has put the case for the retention of the Crafts Centre extremely well, has based most of his argument on the value of crafts and craftsmen as an inspiration towards good design. I do not think that anybody would dispute that. Nor would anybody dispute that they enrich the life of the nation.

What we have to consider is why the Government have decided to terminate the grant. After all, as has been said in Press comments, it is only a very small one. I do not think that the hon. Gentleman would deny that all Government assistance should be reviewed from time to time, but the trouble about small grants in particular is that they may be allowed to run on—not necessarily at exactly the same level—without anyone questioning the principle involved just because they are small. I assure the hon. Gentleman that this question has been most carefully examined over a very long time and has had the personal attention of Ministers.

What was the principle on which the grant was given? Undoubtedly, it may be said that crafts are a good thing in themselves. But so are many other activities, and that in itself would not be a good reason for the Board of Trade to give a grant. In so far as the crafts were considered to be of artistic, cultural or historic interest, that would have been a matter for the Treasury or the Education Departments. In so far as crafts produce goods for sale, there is no reason why they should not stand or fall by the judgment of the purchasing public, just as the composers of music or painters of pictures do. If the public will not pay a price for goods which will remunerate the producer adequately, there is no good economic reason, in ordinary circumstances, why the State should pay a subsidy to enable them to be produced.

The hon. Member for Lichfield and Tamworth quoted the example of other countries. But it seems that any assistance there, in general, is directed to helping rural craftsmen, many of whom live in remote villages and have evolved special skills to give them a livelihood during times when they could not earn one otherwise. What I am saying is that there can be no good economic reason for subsidising studios in populous parts of Britain to enable them to sell.

The reason why the grant was made in 1948 was that craftsmanship was then suffering from the effects of the war, and it was hoped that, with the aid of a modest annual grant, it could be revived and stimulated to make a useful contribution to the improvement of design in industry. That was why the grant came under the Board of Trade's Estimates.

What part has the Crafts Centre played? I think that we should be fairly clear about it. It provides a shop window in Mayfair for studio craftsmen producing fabrics, embroidery, pottery, engraved glass, silverware, jewellery, furniture, woodwork, and so on—a wide range of crafts. To some extent, it sells from stock, but in the main it exhibits the work of craftsmen and handles commissions for them, and it organises one-man exhibitions and other forms of exhibitions.

I understand that the Centre itself does not purchase work. I was not, therefore, entirely convinced of the argument of the hon. Member for Lichfield and Tamworth that the Centre facilitates experimentation and enables craftsmen to carry on with experiments without selling their works. The works still have to be sold.

In passing, I should say that the Crafts Centre also administers the Assistance to Craftsmen Scheme on behalf of the Board of Trade in collaboration with the Design and Research Centre for the Gold, Silver and Jewellery Industries. The assistance takes the form of remission of Purchase Tax on works approved by panels. But now that Purchase Tax has been very substantially reduced and that the main object of the scheme—to resuscitate craftsmanship—has been achieved, the scheme also is being brought to an end.

A craftsman cannot have anything exhibited at the Centre unless he has first submitted work to the appropriate panel to see if it is judged to come up to the standard of artistic design and workmanship set by the Crafts Guilds. Membership is between 500 and 600. Naturally, we considered whether there was any test of the extent to which the Centre made a contribution to the improvement of design in industry. It can be said that it sometimes enables a young craftsman to make a start and to get his first commission, but it cannot be said that this is the only way in which he could do so. Indeed, there are many good craftsmen who are in no way connected with the Centre.

It can also be said that the Centre is a place to which people who want to buy something individual can go, confident that they will be buying work which has been approved by a panel competent to judge or the maker of which has won the approval of a panel competent to judge. But it can hardly be claimed that more than a small proportion of such work of good quality is channelled through the Centre. The hon. Member said that total sales last year were £14,000. The last figure which I have is for 1960–61, which is £11,282, and the profit or commission made by the Centre in the whole year was just under £1,300.

I find it difficult to believe that the Centre as at present conducted is exercising an indispensable influence on industrial design or, for that matter, on craftsmanship as a whole. To put the figures which I have just given in perspective, let me say that there are about 1,700 full-time teachers in art schools and several thousand part-time teachers, including many practising industrial designers. From the point of view of their contribution to industrial design, I should have thought that craftsmen would make a much greater impact through the Design Centre of the Council of Industrial Design.

The Design Centre is far better situated and attracts many times more visitors than the Crafts Centre. We considered whether the Crafts Centre should be transferred to the Design Centre or, rather, whether the Design Centre should take over its functions. I realise that the hon. Member thinks them both equally indispensable. But that would have involved not only capital expenditure at the Design Centre, but also a considerably increased grant.

Mr. Snow

I hope that the hon. Member is not confusing the craftsmen whose case I am advocating with the craftsmen who are normally at the Design Centre. Many of these men or women belong to both, but I should say that the craftsmen at the Crafts Centre were rather the cream of the crafts world.

Mr. Macpherson

I am aware that many masters of the crafts belong to the Crafts Centre. I was saying that had we transferred the Crafts Centre to the Design Centre it would have involved not only capital expenditure, but also considerably increased grants. As it is, the Council keeps a record of about 2,500 designers, classified by skill and experience, and makes it available to firms wanting to get into touch with designers. Any qualified designer may be inscribed on the register on request.

It is perhaps worth mentioning that two of this year's winners of Design Centre awards are members of the Crafts Centre as well as being on the Council's Record of Designers. And, of course, the Council maintains at the Design Centre a small section for the exhibition of craft work. I understand that the Council wishes to continue this section whatever happens to the Crafts Centre.

From the point of view of creative art it is not the Board of Trade but the Arts Council which is the Government's instrument. The substantial grant in aid which the Arts Council receives is available for distribution among what it considers to be the most deserving cases in the arts field. It is open to the Crafts Centre to make a case for assistance to the Arts Council, but it would be for the Arts Council to decide whether to accede to any such request.

Mr. Ridley

rose—

Mr. Macpherson

I hope that my hon. Friend will allow me to continue, as time is running out and there are a number of other things which I wish to say.

To withdraw the grant is not to be taken as a reflection on the Crafts Centre or on the craftsmen who are members of it. Generally speaking, where production is concerned Government grant implies weakness as well as merit. The grant is given as a stimulant to greater strength, but if taken too long stimulants end up by stifling rather than stimulating action. We believe that the crafts are strong enough to stand on their own feet, and that it is better for them that they should do so. We therefore think it right that the grant should come to an end, but that is not to say that the Government consider that the Crafts Centre itself should come to an end.

People get very worked up when it is proposed to discontinue a Government grant. They say that it shows a lack of appreciation, but one is bound to ask where is the lack of appreciation. In 1960–61, the Centre raised only £1,225 from subscriptions—a good deal less than is collected in the average village for local purposes. I understand that the Centre is making a fresh appeal. If it can convince those interested in the crafts that it is performing the valuable function which the hon. Gentleman claims it is performing, I am sure it will recoup the discontinued Government grant several times over.

For the reasons I have given, we do not feel that it will be in the interests of the crafts or of the craftsmen themselves that we should continue to give this grant to the Crafts Centre, and, with very great regret, I must resist the hon. Gentleman's plea, supported, as it has been, briefly, but ably, by my hon. Friend the Member for Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley).

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-eight minutes to Five O'clock.