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Council chiefs have said the cancellation of Edinburgh's summer festivals is providing an opportunity to shape their future direction, with more of a focus on "our people, place and environment". With 4 million visitors in the city centre during the summers, heritage experts and others have expressed growing concerns about the scale and unintended side effects of the festivals, including safety issues, environmental damage and the squeeze on affordable housing due to the growth of short-term holiday lets and hotels.

The Court of Appeal has rejected a claim that visitors' use of a viewing gallery in a new extension to Tate Modern constitutes a 'private nuisance'. Occupants of flats in a development next to Tate had hoped to obtain an injunction requiring trustees to close the viewing gallery that overlooks their homes.

The flat-owners alleged that visitors have an uninterrupted view into their living areas and have been taking photographs and observing them through binoculars. They alleged that the use of the viewing gallery unreasonably interfered with their enjoyment of their flats so as to be a nuisance, and claimed that Tate was in breach of the Human Rights Act. But the Court has dismissed the claims, with the judge finding that, in choosing to buy their properties - which have floor-to-ceiling glass windows - they had submitted themselves to increased sensitivity to privacy. 

Research conducted in late March for the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO) among over 2,000 adults found that six out of seven British households with extra time on their hands were planning to broaden their musical horizons, with a third of these saying they want to discover more classical music. One in five of the under-35s and over a third of over 65s in isolation said they wanted to learn more about the genre.

Since the start of the coronavirus lockdown, the RPO has seen a three-fold increase in its website traffic and a seven-fold increase in engagement on its social media channels. Its online activities are being presented through a new programme, RPO at Home, which includes its first streamed performance, videos of players in their own homes, an RPO at Home YouTube playlist and a card game through which audiences can get to know the RPO’s musicians better. 

RPO Managing Director James Williams commented: “Music is often seen as a good tonic to cope with stress and uncertainty... it will continue to surprise and delight for far longer than the time we will be in isolation."

Property developers are proposing "arts related uses" for the ground floor of a project to revive the derelict Whitworth Mill on the the banks of the River Nene in Peterborough. An area of external space would be used as an arts performance space within the development, which, if planning permission is approved, will include office space and a boutique hotel.

The Government has indicated that it will enable theatres and other cultural venues to keep Gift Aid on payments made for events cancelled due to coronavirus. The Charity Tax Group and others, including Arts Council England, are lobbying for the tax relief to be applied to any refund donated to charities in lieu of cancelled tickets or debts not to be collected.

CTG said: "While Gift Aid would not ordinarily be eligible on such gifts this would help to recognise the generosity of the British public and incentivise them to not seek refunds from charities, which are already struggling with cashflow issues... There is precedence for such a mechanism through the Retail Gift Aid scheme and this would be a quick and effective measure in support of charities and donors.”

CTG is now liaising with HMRC and DCMS to confirm the details.

Reading Borough Council's bid to buy Reading Prison from the Ministry of Justice and convert it into an arts venue has failed. The derelict prison costs more than £250,000 a year to maintain and was put up for sale to the highest bidder for development. The Council’s bid depended on securing significant external fundings to manage the risk of taking on the historic property, which sits next to The Abbey on a site of national significance, offering "huge potential for heritage-led regeneration".

The Council's planning restrictions mean any site development will have to include a cultural or historical element that draws on the significance of the prison, which was immortalised by Oscar Wilde's poem The Ballad of Reading Gaol. They will be working with the as yet unnamed successful bidder to ensure the prison's historical and cultural value is recognised in the future.

The campaign group Save Reading Gaol has expressed sadness at the failure of the Council's bid, saying they will now try to persuade the new owners to apportion part of the heritage site for the community.