HC Deb 25 June 1984 vol 62 cc683-4
24. Mr. Proctor

asked the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State answering in respect of the Arts how much has been spent by the Arts Council on subsidies to opera and ballet companies in each of the last three years for which figures are available; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Waldegrave

Total Arts Council expenditure on opera and dance, including Scottish and Welsh Arts Council expenditure, was £25.07 million in 1981–82; £29.21 million in 1982–83; and £31.94 million in 1983–84.

Mr. Proctor

In view of the large sums of public money spent on, and the high price of tickets for, opera and ballet, will my hon. Friend ask the Arts Council to look at this expenditure again? Will he, in particular, explain to the Arts Council that it might be better to get some private funding for opera and ballet?

Mr. Waldegrave

Having spent last evening listening to "Cosi fan Tutti" at Glyndebourne, I assure my hon. Friend that there are considerable private resources going into opera. If my hon. Friend is asking me to speak to my noble Friend in the sense of diminishing those resources, I must give him a disappointing answer.

Mr. Dalyell

What has been the Government's response to the representations that they have had both from Scottish Opera and Scottish Ballet on their financial future?

Mr. Waldegrave

Those representations are, in the first instance, for the Arts Council. I have no doubt that if representations are made to my noble Friend he will consider them seriously.

Mr. Maclean

For how long does my hon. Friend think the taxpayer can continue to subsidise Royal Opera to the tune of £25 per ticket per performance? Does he think that it is part of his job and that of his Department to see that the many, who are taxpayers, should be made to pay for the pleasures of an elitist few?

Mr. Waldegrave

I think that my hon. Friend must have missed the recent and welcome changes in the ticket structure at Covent Garden, where an increasing number of cheap tickets are now being made available, which is a sensible policy. No country in the world can put on opera without subsidy of some kind, either through tax or by way of direct Government subsidy, so that my answer to my hon. Friend is, yes, I regard it as part of my job.

Mr. Buchan

Will the Minister take on board the fact that our objection is not so much to having almost one third of central Government allocations spent on opera as to the cut that that has meant for the rest of the arts in Britain? What is to happen in respect of the £34 million pledged this year to local authorities, which are the other supporters of the arts? Will that continue? The Minister for the Arts did not make that clear in the other place last week.

Mr. Waldegrave

With respect, my noble Friend made it entirely clear that there was a commitment to future funding on the same sort of scale. The hon. Gentleman makes his usual cry for more money in general. Money was earmarked for opera and ballet and it was additional to the other money. Everybody would like more money for everything, but I do not think that the hon. Gentleman is asking us to diminish the amount that is spent on the great opera and ballet house.