Platform – Hopes and fears

All those who have worked in theatre for five years or more will be able to bear witness to the impact of the resources that poured into the sector in 2001. Companies thrived, salaries rose and more work was presented to more people. Those same practitioners will also be able to attest to the destabilising effect of the freezing of those same resources in 2004. Arts managers reared under a Tory Government that had consistently reaffirmed its lack of commitment to the arts with funding freezes through the 1990s felt a familiar sinking feeling. And so it is with a mixture of hope and fear that we turn to the forthcoming Comprehensive Spending Review (p1) and the settlement it will award to the arts. The CSR may seem a long way off. Its findings are not due to be announced until the summer of 2007 and the effect of its twitches of the purse strings will not be felt until the following April. It may also seem a very removed process, conducted as it is behind Whitehall doors by policy wonks with billions to play with. It is easy to think it best to leave the politicking to the politicians.
In light of this, arts practitioners should be glad to see their representative bodies starting to make the case for arts funding. Arts Council England too will shortly begin a year-long campaign to promote the cause. But it is not enough to leave the lobbying to the experts. Next months local elections across England may, if polls are to be believed, shift the balance of power in many authorities significantly and consequently affect the resources available locally to the arts. At the same time, in Northern Ireland, moves to hand local government a bigger say in arts spending will force all practitioners there to lobby locally and sharpen their political weaponry.

Pushing the case for culture is the responsibility of all who care about the arts and are concerned about their own livelihoods and futures. This requires artists and arts organisations to provide the evidence to support the work of the lobbyists. It requires collective advocacy to ensure the realisation of our best hopes for the future and not the confirmation of our fears. We are all political now.

Liz Hill and Brian Whitehead, Co-editors