The Stage

Shadow culture secretary in pledge to reinstate art’s Lottery share

Published Tuesday 16 November 2004 at 15:15 by Ruth Gillespie

Shadow culture secretary John Whittingdale has pledged to ‘restore’ the National Lottery by concentrating funds once more upon its original beneficiaries such as the arts.

Speaking during a seminar at the National Gallery, Whittingdale accused Labour of siphoning off sums from the Lottery to fund its own political priorities, which he claimed should have been paid for by the taxpayer.

He said: “I agreed with John Major when he recently referred to the treatment of the Lottery as grand larceny. Unfortunately, it is the case that in recent years money available to the arts has been diminishing and, with alternative attractions appearing as a result of the gambling bill, the decline of ticket sales is also likely to increase.

“I acknowledge there is a role for public money in the arts but when it comes to competing priorities for government spending other areas, such as health and education, take precedence. For that reason we launched the Lottery and we have a huge amount to celebrate. A Conservative government would stop using this money to fund what we believe should be funded by the taxpayer.”

When the Conservatives founded the Lottery ten years ago it was based on the principle that the money for good causes would be allocated to projects which the Treasury would not normally fund. Whittingdale said the Lottery had been an unqualified success, raising billions of pounds for UK cultural and sporting institutions, but warned that money to good causes has almost halved in the last seven years.

The shadow culture secretary reiterated policies set out by the former Tory arts spokesman Boris Johnson on providing tax incentives to encourage private investment in cultural institutions. He highlighted privately funded companies, such as the Saatchi Gallery and Classic FM, as examples of cultural organisations already successfully operating without government intervention.

However, Bob Carlton, artistic director of the Queen’s Theatre, Hornchurch, warned the Conservatives against a return to the eighties, when lesser-known regional institutions suffered a double blow due to a lack of interest from private investors and a lack of government support.

He said: “My worry is that putting the emphasis on philanthropy rather than funding is a throw back. In the past the push for private investment has been towards the big sexy institutions. The Queen’s Theatre is still one of the poorest funded venues in the country and yet it deals with 6,000 young people a year. These smaller organisations won’t get the philanthropy.”

Former shadow arts minister Boris Johnson was unable to attend the seminar, which was sponsored by law firm Farrer & Co and accountants Haysmacintyre, after his controversial sacking from the Opposition front bench. Baroness Buscombe, shadow arts minister in the House of Lords, replaced him as chair.