HC Deb 25 May 1984 vol 60 cc1386-94

Question again proposed, That this House do now adjourn.

11.17 am
Mr. Tony Banks (Newham, North-West)

I should like to preface my remarks on this subject with a few general remarks about the way in which the arts are treated in the House. I believe that hon. Members on both sides of the House are disturbed and dissatisfied at the way in which they are treated.

There are three points at issue. First, there is no Minister directly responsible to the House for the arts. Instead, we have a Parliamentary Under-Secretary for the Environment, the hon. Member for Bristol, West (Mr. Waldegrave), the renowned all-singing, all-dancing Minister who, among his many responsibilities, is helping to preside over the abolition of local democracy, the disposal of waste matter, and the arts. It is a strange combination of duties to give an hon. Member. Sooner or later one expects to see him pulling pints in the Strangers' Bar.

The second point of dissatisfaction is the time that we are allowed for parliamentary questions. We have 10 minutes in this House once every three weeks. Earl Gowrie used to attend to listen to the questions but these days he, too, is lacking in enthusiasm.

Thirdly, important arts matters of truly national significance are scarcely, if ever, given parliamentary time. Instead, we are having to rely more and more on planted parliamentary questions and written answers. I will give a few recent examples.

The 1984–85 arts budget, spending over £100 million of taxpayers' money, was the subject of a written answer. The Arts Council's important funding reorganisation was set out in a book called "The Glory of the Garden", which I at first thought was some sort of seed catalogue. It has had no discussion whatever

The extra funding for the arts that the Government recently announced—in the event of the abolition of the GLC and the metropolitan county councils — has not been discussed; in fact, it came up during the middle of one of the Secretary of State's characteristic and woefully inadequate speeches, when he slipped it into the Local Government (Interim Provisions) Bill. The subject had nothing to do with the Bill but was put in as a way of trying to placate more overt criticism.

There has been no discussion on the Select Committee report or on the subsequent. White Paper, which was a pretty poor scissors-and-paste job done at the Office of Arts and Libraries. We have had no chance to discuss those vital issues.

The arts are not a minority issue and they are not a minority interest, although some people claim that they are. Tens of millions of people in Britain each year go to the theatre, to films, to ballet, to opera, to arts centres and museums. It adds up to a formidable number, so it cannot be said that we are discussing a minority subject today. The state of the arts in London and elsewhere is a matter of concern and significance for this House and for the country at large and should be treated accordingly by the Government.

I should like the Minister to answer three specific questions. First, will he inform the Prime Minister that this House wants an Arts Minister answerable to the Commons? Secondly, will the Minister discuss with the Leader of the House the need for a longer period of arts questions — say, half an hour rather than 10 minutes? Thirdly, will he seek an early, full debate on the arts and discuss with his colleagues the possibility of an annual debate on the state of the arts?

Since 1981 the Labour GLC has doubled its arts budget in real terms. I presided over that increase, and I argued for it with my colleagues on political grounds. The first was the unemployment crisis in London. Well over 360,000 Londoners have been forced by Government economic policies to endure the compulsory leisure brought about by unemployment. The arts, of course, cannot solve unemployment but they can ameliorate the condition and help to explain the cause.

The long-term changes in work patterns should, in theory, provide for a greater degree of voluntary leisure time for working people but, as we know, under capitalism changes in technology merely mean longer and longer dole queues and increasing social unrest. The whole concept behind the GLC's arts policy is to shape provision for the arts and recreation to the future changes that we wish to see in our society.

Arguing from a political point of view, arts activities can be used to identify and express human needs and goals and in that way to contribute to the wider process of social change and betterment. I have always maintained that art and politics have been inextricably linked, and I believe that the GLC has simply been open about it. We have been political but political in the broadest sense rather than in the narrow party political sense.

At present, in London there are two developments of great significance facing the arts, and they need to be considered. First, there is the Arts Council's new strategy for priority areas, as detailed in its document "The Glory of the Garden". Most of the £6 million that the Arts Council seeks to save is to come from the regions themselves rather than from London. That point was picked up when people examined the proposals more closely. If the Arts Council carries out its proposal, London will lose about 5 per cent. of its funding in 1985–86.

I believe that more important than the funding decisions is the fact that the Arts Council's analysis of London's needs is misdirected in several respects. London is treated by the Arts Council in its document as though it is merely a large city rather than a region. The GLC area consists of 610 square miles and embraces 7 million people in 32 boroughs. There are massive economic and social differences in London and there are great differences in the provision of arts facilities.

We know that there is a great concentration of arts facilities in the centre of London and a great lack of facilities in the outer London boroughs. The GLC, through its arts policy, has been trying to deal with that problem by seeking to push the arts into the outer parts of London and the edges of the region.

The Arts Council's proposal on the cutting of grants will mean a loss to London of important touring companies, such as C. A .S .T., 7:84 and Temba. Those companies, of which hon. Members might not have heard, perform in venues such as pubs and clubs in the outer part of London. Their activities are very important because they provide an access to the arts that is so clearly lacking at present.

There is what is called the fear of the threshold. In Britain we put the arts into magnificent great halls. The most recent is the Barbican—the last great folly of all. That building then becomes a barrier; it actually discourages people from going in. The GLC's idea was to put theatre and dance into places where people feel more at home—for example, in clubs and pubs. That seems to me to be very beneficial, but the Arts Council, by cutting the activities of touring companies that perform in such venues, is restricting the arts. The King's Head Theatre club, which will lose its grant, is yet another example. For some years it has been putting on a variable and exciting programme but it will be forced to close after 1985 unless something happens.

There is another element in the proposal to cut the touring companies. The Arts Council appears to be trying to demolish political theatre. It is suggesting that the various companies that I have mentioned have been putting on productions that are considered to be too Left-wing for the tastes of the chairman of the Arts Council or the Ministers to whom he is responsible.

The news that the Wakefield Tricycle Theatre—which is in Brent, not in Wakefield—is to lose its Arts Council funding was greeted with great pleasure by the hon. Member for Brent, North (Dr. Boyson). He was reported as saying that the Tricycle puts on plays which attack the social fabric of our society. I made a quick examination of the more recent productions put on by the Tricycle Theatre. Its latest productions include "The Playboy of the Western World", which I understand has nothing to do with the Chancellor of the Exchequer. There was a theatre group from Soweto. There was a play based on the story of Calamity Jane—that is not the Prime Minister, I understand. There was a production starring Hazel O'Connor, and "Buried Treasure", a comedy starring Prunella Scales — very subversive and revolutionary. There was a production called "Smile Orange", a comedy about a Jamaica hotel. If those are the sorts of plays that the hon. Member for Brent, North believes to be undermining his way of life, it must be a very peculiar way of life.

It appears from a reading of its proposals that the Arts Council is attempting to eliminate political theatre. I am sure that it is not acting directly on instructions from Ministers, but I believe that it is making a conscious attempt to please. What else would one expect from a dedicated orthodox Tory like Sir William Rees-Mogg? So much for the arm's-length principle.

The Arts Council's third mistake, in relation to arts funding in London, is its proposal to end the grant to the Queen's Theatre in Hornchurch and the Churchill Theatre in Bromley in 1985–86. Both those theatres are in Tory boroughs. Both those boroughs are in the outer parts of London. The theatres are heavily funded by those Tory boroughs, and I give the boroughs credit for that.

The Arts Council states that it wants partnership with the boroughs, but it is not setting a good example when it penalises Tory boroughs which are heavily funding theatres in areas where they are desperately needed. The Arts Council continues, in "The Glory of the Garden", by warning Kensington and Chelsea that it should be providing money for the Royal Court Theatre. But it gives no encouragement to Kensington and Chelsea to do so. Kensington and Chelsea is known to be one of the meanest councils in London. The state of the old Kensington town hall shows that it is also one of the worst councils in terms of environmental protection. The Tories in Kensington and Chelsea, if asked to put money into the Royal Court, will point to what happened in Bromley or Hornchurch. They will say that if they put money into the Royal Court, the Arts Council will simply withdraw its own funding. The Arts Council has therefore done itself a disservice by announcing the end of the grants to those two theatres. I hope it will reconsider the decision.

The most direct and deliberate cut will be the withdrawal of £280,000 from the London Orchestral Concert Board. The idea is that one of the existing London orchestras—I know that the Arts Council has the Royal Philharmonic in mind—should move to Nottingham and form a new eastern orchestra.

There is no way in which the RPO will go to Nottingham. Nottingham is a lovely place, but the RPO cannot earn in Nottingham the money that it can earn in London. Orchestras rely on recording contracts and on forming different orchestral groups. In order to do that, they need to be based in a large conurbation. The result of the Arts Council's decision will, therefore, simply be to deprive London's orchestras of £280,000. That is a very poor decision.

In normal circumstances, the GLC would consider making up all those shortfalls in the interests of London's arts as a whole, but, as the GLC itself is facing abolition, it is not a realistic prospect.

I should like now to refer to the abolition of the GLC and the role of the GLC in relation to the arts. The GLC has the largest arts and recreation structure in the United Kingdom. It has more clients than the Arts Council. Those clients range from national centres to street theatre. The current GLC arts budget, with its museums and historic houses budget, amounts to well over £20 million, in the context of an arts and recreation budget of over £50 million.

I welcome the Government's decision to provide an extra £34 million for the arts after 1986–87 in the event of the abolition of the GLC and the metropolitan counties, although I hope that the Minister can tell us whether or not that sum will be index-linked after 1986–87. The announcement was a great victory for the arts lobby. When the original announcements were made in the White Paper "Streamlining the Cities", I warned the Minister to his face that we would give him a lot of trouble over the arts. To his credit, the Minister said that, if that was the case, he would buy us off. That is politics, and I am glad of it. It shows that the arts have muscle when they want to use it. However, even with that extra funding, London will still lose £4 million to £5 million after the abolition of the GLC.

There is no way in which the boroughs will be able to make up that shortfall. Rate-capping is on the way, and with the general restriction on local authority expenditure there is no way in which the boroughs—or districts out of London—will be able to replace the funding that will be lost with the GLC and the MCCs. The extra money that is being discussed for London in the event of the abolition of the GLC would be channelled through the Arts Council. It will not go to the community and ethnic arts that the GLC has done so much to stimulate, or to maintaining the big regional festivals such as the Easter parade, the May day festivals, Thames day and the South Bank weekend horse show. Those festivals attract hundreds of thousands of visitors every year, and I cannot see how they will be continued. The Arts Council has neither the expertise nor the desire to do so, and the boroughs would not be able to afford it.

If the Arts Council continues its present attitude, the areas that the GLC has done much to encourage will suffer great deprivation. I hope that, in addition to restoring to London its city-wide government, the next Labour Government will make the Arts Council far more democratically accountable for all its activities.

I wish to leave time for the Minister's reply, being conscious that it will have been somewhat shortened because of the earlier important statement. I hope that the Minister will say something about the South Bank. In the consultative paper on the arts which accompanied "Streamlining the Cities" there was a reference to running the South Bank on commercially viable lines. That struck terror into my heart. It would mean an end to the GLC's open foyer policy at the Royal Festival Hall. In II months, we have attracted an extra million people to the Royal Festival Hall by offering many added attractions. If the Minister has not visited the foyer, I extend to him an invitation to come over one lunchtime to see what is being done on the South Bank and what is at risk. I might even buy him a glass of champagne. Despite what one reads in the vulgar press, one can still get champagne in the Royal Festival Hall, and there is much to celebrate there.

I am glad that the Government have learnt the error of their ways and changed their original proposals for London. I am glad that they are prepared to put in extra money. The arts are not simply the icing on the cake; they are one of the ingredients of the cake. They should rank with housing, transport, the social services and education. The arts should serve the people and be responsive to their needs. If the GLC is abolished and the Arts Council takes over some of the arts funding, London will suffer a serious drop in its level of arts funding and there will be a return to the narrow middle-class attitude towards the arts which is characteristic of arts funding in this country. That would be bad both for London and the arts.

11.37 am
Mr. Norman Buchan (Paisley, South)

I apologise for not having been present at the beginning of the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks), which took me unawares.

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to stress the importance of the arts and of Government action. It is not only the Arts Council but the Government whose actions are of importance. The Minister responsible for the arts tells us to take politics out of the arts. However, Government action has thrust politics firmly into the foreground. A collection of councils cannot replace the overall authority of the GLC in being conscious of a responsibility towards arts activities which may be based in neighbouring boroughs. The shift of support from the regions to the districts in Scotland has shown what will happen. The situation will be worse in England, with rate-capping, rate-cutting and the abolition of the GLC and the MCCs.

In what way does the Minister expect matching funds to be made available for theatres such as the Royal Court? We are already told that 7:84 England will not get help for its tour with the play "Six Men of Dorset" because the TUC may provide support. Once matching funds are provided, Arts Council funds are cut. We do not need to make predictions, because it is already happening. Why, then, should Kensington and Chelsea support the Royal Court?

Secondly, there is the question of the £34 million. The Government are right to provide that money—there was no other recourse—but Scotland is now asking why, with the change from region to district, no extra provision was made in Scotland. The Government's problem is that if they continue to pay that type of money centrally to support the borough and district councils that were formerly in metropolitan county areas or the GLC area, it will be asked why any other local authority should pay its whack. A major theoretical and financial problem faces the arts and everyone is worried about it. We should have an answer to that.

My hon. Friend is right. In the eyes of everyone who has studied the Arts Council's document and considered the balance of cuts, there have been political decisions. An obvious example of that is 7:84, England. In view of what has been said about the importance of community and active arts, what excuse is there for cutting the best and most professional black theatre in Britain—the Temba Theatre? That which is socially, never mind politically, involved has been cut.

I am sorry that this speech has been so short and I apologise for my late arrival. I hope that the Minister will examine the wider issues that are involved in what the Government are doing to the metropolitan authorities and the GLC. I should like to reiterate the final and wise words of my hon. Friend. In the new circumstances, the arts must be seen as being as important as the other social problems facing the country. That is a means by which some of the attitudes concerning social problems can be solved.

11.40 am
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. William Waldegrave)

It is rather unnerving to find the hon. Member for Newham, North-West (Mr. Banks) in such a conciliatory mood. I shall, of course, take him up on his offer of a glass of champagne on the South Bank, a complex that I know well. One of the few consolations of working in that appalling building called Elizabeth house when in the Department of Education and Science is being able to escape to the South Bank at lunchtime. I formed that habit when employed there. I shall not make the offensive remarks that I have prepared. The hon. Gentleman made a few about me, as he always does. Perhaps he owes my hon. Friend the Member for Ealing, Acton (Sir G. Young), the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, a drink because, due to an oversight, the hon. Gentleman did not turn up for this debate last time, although we read about it in The Standard. It ran a story under the headline Arts goes to Commons but the arts did not go to the Commons because the hon. Gentleman forgot to come.

Mr. Tony Banks

I should have apologised for that at the beginning of my speech. I was doing a public meeting in Hastings. I rushed back on the train and was crossing Blackfriars bridge when I saw the light go out. Once again, I think that my Front Bench was not able to keep the proceedings going.

Mr. Waldegrave

I can only agree with the hon. Gentleman's last analysis. There was some failure higher up the line. There have been some comic muddles in the campaign against the abolition of the GLC. The poor old horse-drawn cart got a bit behind, largely as a result of the hon. Gentleman's persistence during the debate in the middle of the night. Especially enjoyable was having the hon. Member for Holborn and St. Pancras (Mr. Dobson), who was here a moment ago and might return, presenting the petition on behalf of the GLC—he was one of the most doughty campaigners against the GLC when he was a leader of a borough council.

The hon. Member for Newham, North-West is in no other respect like the fat boy in Dickens except that he likes to make our flesh creep. I do not wish to doubt his commitment to the arts, but a good deal of what he says shows that the arts has been and is being used as one of the campaigning territories against the abolition of the GLC. It has been used unfairly to stir up worries which the Government have shown themselves willing to meet. The hon. Gentleman paid tribute to my noble Friend the Minister for the Arts for the sums of money that he has procured to meet the problems that will be created by abolition. I can give an assurance, within the normal type of provisos that any Minister must make about future public spending, as my noble Friend was able to say, that there will be £34 million and equivalent sums. That is Treasuryese for saying that the sum is secure in real terms, but I must add, "within the general constraints of public expenditure." My noble Friend did exceedingly well on behalf of the arts to secure considerable funding. Ministers for the Arts since 1979 have all done well in terms of resources. In real terms, there has been an increase in spending of 8.4 per cent. from 1979–80 to 1984–85. At a time of general restraint on spending, that is a good achievement.

The hon. Gentleman rightly said that there are two important things going on in the arts world. They have separate origins but interlock. The first is the Arts Council's radical examination of its funding. The hon. Gentleman's criticism seemed to be in respect of some aspect of that process. He did not say that it was wrong for the Arts Council to have a radical look at its funding. The Labour party and its spokesman, the hon. Member for Paisley, South (Mr. Buchan), have often argued for greater provision in the regions. The attempt to meet that in the strategic document has to some extent been welcomed on both sides of the House.

The hon. Gentleman's point about the boroughs' role in future is well taken. There is a tremendous opportunity and challenge for the boroughs in the policy of devolution to them. We intend to make the boroughs more powerful, to give them more money and to give them a greater share of the government of London. I strongly hope that some of the attitudes that both parties show in some of the London boroughs that they control, although there are honourable exceptions on both sides, will rise to the challenge. Part of the prize that is being offered to them will be lost if they do not rise to the challenge in regard to the arts. I know that my noble Friend has been putting that point across to them.

It would be wrong to be wholly pessimistic about the future borough role. They will have to change some of their attitudes. I hope that they will. They are being asked to do much more in the government of London. In regard to negotiations about theatres such as the Royal Court between the Arts Council and the boroughs, the Arts Council will be aware of the reaction that could derive from a borough and will have to take that into account in the negotiations. It is not necessarily wrong for the Arts Council to consider some areas and theatres in London and say that boroughs on the edge of London that have the highest per capita income in western Europe, comparable with parts of France and Germany, should do more to enable the Arts Council to release more money for other parts of the country.

I would not want to give the hon. Gentleman an assurance that there will be no Minister for the Arts in another place in future. Lord Donaldson was an extremely distinguished and good Minister for the Arts. While we have a bicameral Parliament we must accept that there will be Ministers in another place. I find the hon. Gentleman's request rather ironic, because on several other matters he and his right hon. and hon. Friends have put great hope on another place. He blows hot and cold on the matter.

Like others who are interested in the arts, I feel a little hard done by in regard to the short time that we have to debate the arts. I shall report back to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House on that. The matter is raised from time to time. I would welcome being grilled for rather longer. Equally, it is clearly time to have a major debate on the arts. I shall report that to my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House.

Mr. Buchan

I remind the Minister of the statement by the Leader of the House last week in which he recognised the importance of a debate, as I understand it, in Government time.

Mr. Waldegrave

It is simply a matter of fixing a date. I look forward to the debate, which it would be sensible to allow to stray into areas normally covered by the heritage, because the division between the two is often artificial.

The hon. Gentleman the Member for Newham, North-West asked about the South Bank. I pay tribute to the way in which, under both parties in the GLC, the South Bank has grown in importance. However, I and my noble Friend believe that there is an immense way still to go. My noble Friend envisages the centre developing into something comparable with the Lincoln centre—something that is used for a wide range of activities. There is no intention to take a narrow and foolish view of an immediate return, in the sense of profits, for every activity that goes on. The Arts Council will have to support many of the activities there in the future.

The Government have listened carefully to the representations made about arts in the London area as a result of the abolition of the GLC and, as the hon. Member for Newham, North-West said, we have responded in several ways and made some changes, for example, with the Geffrye and Horniman museums. Above all, we have responded by finding money to carry London through the period of turbulence and readjustment that is bound to follow the abolition of the GLC. The funds available are already considerable. The Arts Council now spends about £30 million in London, much of it on national centres. When the hon. Member for Newham, North-West was chairman of the GLC arts committee, he took the view that some national centres in London should be the responsibility of the Arts Council. He caused much trouble in doing so and threatened to dump the Royal Opera House and the English National Opera. There was a great argument about that, which makes some of the reassuring noises from the GLC about funding projects that were put to it rather hard to believe. One must take them with a pinch of salt, because the GLC has had its radical proposals in the past. It was only the lawyers who stopped the sale of the pictures at Kenwood, which was another unnecessary—

Mr. Tony Banks

I have always believed that national centres should be funded nationally. As to the pictures at Kenwood, the GLC was demonstrating at the time that if it was forced into extremis it would have no option but to consider selling some of its assets in order to save some threatened companies.

Mr. Waldegrave

If one considers the list of some of the activities that are funded, it does not look like that to the citizens of London. That was a dangerous thing to do in that it raised questions about bequests, which would have been better left alone. Although no sensible person could do other than saw that the arts and artistic creativity are one aspect of all civilisation, "civilisation" is a seamless garment in this connection. One can no more discuss the democracy of ancient Athens without discussing the plays of Aeschylus than one can discuss 16th century England without discussing the plays of Shakespeare and their political manifestations.

The cruder uses of patronage by the GLC, such as the one that we saw in yesterday evening's newspaper, of providing money to a pop group that sings anti-Government songs, have brought politics into the arts in a rather trivial way. That undermines the arts and invites the backlash to which the hon. Gentleman referred. It would be wise to retain the arm's length principle. The House is at its best and democracies are at their best when they say, in connection with some areas over which they have ultimate sovereignty, that they will pass self-denying ordinances and allow some activities to be carried on outside the normal argy-bargy of smoke-filled rooms and politics of the tougher sort.

The GLC has not done the arts a service by trying to use them in the present campaign, and it has laid up troubles for the arts by letting genies out of bottles that will be difficult to return. But in other matters there is wide agreement across the House. This short debate shows that in this area at least—if I may return to the glass of champagne that is now owed to me—the traditional civilities of the House are not yet wholly at an end.