Lib Dem’s Foster hits back at Purnell’s targets claim

Published Wednesday 11 July 2007 at 14:55 by Alistair Smith

Liberal Democrat culture spokesman Don Foster has launched a scathing attack on recently appointed culture secretary James Purnell, accusing him of wanting to scrap inclusion targets in the arts because his department has failed to meet its current quotas.

Foster was responding to a claim made in a recent interview by Purnell that the battle for greater inclusion of groups such as ethnic minorities in the arts had already been ‘won.’

Purnell told The Guardian: “The point about targets - the notion that the arts should justify their existence by meeting quotas relating to ‘priority groups’ such as ethnic minorities - is that the battle has been won.”

However, the Lib Dems have stressed that the number of people from ethnic minorities visiting arts events has actually dropped by a quarter of a million since 2003.

Foster commented: “James Purnell claims the battle for inclusion in the arts has been won, but his own figures tell an entirely different story. Far from winning the battle, his department has failed on nearly all their arts inclusion targets. No wonder he wants to see many targets scrapped.

“A flawed and failed target system is not the way to involve wider sections of society in the arts. A well-funded arts sector would, at least, help. That is why Liberal Democrats oppose the raid of more than £500m - to fill the Olympic budget black hole - on lottery funds supporting culture, arts and heritage.”