The Stage

Hodge calls for more confident arts council with ‘respect of the sector’

Published Tuesday 13 November 2007 at 14:25 by Alistair Smith

TMA Conference: Arts Council England must become more “outward looking” and seek to engage and support organisations which it does not fund, according to culture minister Margaret Hodge.

Speaking at the TMA conference, Hodge gave her support to the arts council, saying that it is “fundamental to the successful model of investment in culture [in England]”, but stressed that it must adhere to five key roles if it is to be an “effective and responsive” organisation in the future.

She said: “We need firstly an arts council that is robustly independent of government. Yes, it should be publicly accountable and responsive but it should not be afraid to make difficult decisions, to take risk and challenge.

“Second, I want to see an arts council that is 100% focused on artistic excellence and which has the respect of the sector for its expertise and its knowledge of the arts. No one in the country deserves second rate arts and public money should not be spent on anything that is not, or does not, have the potential to be excellent.”

She added that ACE also needed to play an “enabling role” to support well run arts companies and that it needed to help the development of the entire sector, especially in areas such as new technology.

Hodge added: “Finally, I’d like to see the arts council playing a stronger and more confident leadership role across the arts as a whole. The only way to make a real impact, for example, on arts participation is to look beyond ACE’s regularly funded organisations and work in partnership with voluntary arts and other organisations around the country, which support participation in the arts.

“I think we’re already beginning to see the emergence of an arts council that is more outward looking, not just focused on its RFOs, but engaging with other stakeholders, such as local government, the Regional Development Agencies, broadcasters and other cultural institutions… We need an arts council that fulfils these roles now more than ever before.”