§ Mr. Hugh Jenkinsasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science if she will undertake that it is not planned to make any cuts in the grant to the Arts Council and that no instructions have been or will be given to the Arts Council to make any cuts in its grants.
§ Mr. St. John-StevasThe economies which the Government are considering relate to planned future expenditure and not to grants which have been offered to the Arts Council. There will therefore be no cuts in the grants made to the council, but the Government are bound to consider, in the present circumstances, whether future grants, including the grant for 1974–75, can continue to rise at the rate they have done since 1970. The question of grants to individual clients of the Arts Council is, of course, a matter for the council.