Fruits of labour?

Pride and joy seem to emanate from the Arts Minister, even over the telephone. Margaret Hodge is a lady who takes our pleasures seriously – now that the “tyranny of the red box” which she experienced in her previous ministerial roles has been replaced by a red box full of arts issues, she says “I’m in seventh heaven, really.” In fact, she’s even learning to play the harp. She says she is proud of the way that Labour has “brought arts back into the centre of people’s consciousness”. Pointing to the recent increases in arts funding at the last spending round, she declares that “I think Labour now completely ‘gets it’ on the importance of the arts.” Does she think there is now more understanding in Parliament of the importance of the arts?

Insisting that she isn’t just “being instrumental in my understanding of the arts”, Hodge immediately establishes her own appreciation of the arts sector, emphasising that “the cultural and heritage infrastructure in a community is vital to making it a place that you want to live and work in, and can help to build strong cohesive communities as well”. She flags up “the importance of creativity in children’s education… and the role of culture in regeneration, and the importance of the arts just for itself”, and adds that “all those things are getting much more centre stage”.

Peachy keen

Ever the wet blanket, I ask about the credit crunch. We in the arts know that the sector is usually first in line for cuts when the economic going gets tough. “We are in a tight fiscal environment”, warns Hodge. “I’m really keen that all arts organisations shouldn’t build complete dependence on public funding – they should see themselves as social enterprises and develop a diversity of funding streams, because that’s the way in which the arts can build long-term security.” She adds that “it’s also a way that frees the arts from the imperatives of being dependent on public funding”. This is a frank acknowledgement that some arts organisations in England have become less willing to submit to the demands placed on them by Arts Council England (ACE), and leads us on to the hot topic of private giving. Labour and Conservative policy on this issue seem to have been born under the same star (see AP173 for our interview with Shadow Arts Minister Ed Vaizey). “When you become minister, you’ve got to say, there are probably three or four things you can change in your time. The encouragement of philanthropic giving is one of the tasks I’ve set myself,” Hodge avers. She reels off some statistics – that the British give only half as much as Americans do, and the poorest 20% of society gives four times more than the richest 20%. “Only 4% of philanthropic giving goes to the arts”, she continues. “So I’m developing a strong strategy on how we can encourage a culture of giving in the UK.”

Hodge has three policy strands in development. One involves fiscal incentives – presumably including tax breaks, though she doesn’t spell it out – and a second is to give “better training and support to cultural organisations so that they see… giving as an integral part of the work that you do when you manage a cultural organisation”. The third strand sounds very much like the Tory idea of honours for donors, but Hodge won’t give details. “I’m looking at how we can get better recognition of private giving to the arts”, is all she will reveal. When pressed, she simply says “wait and see”. Beyond funding issues, however, she points to other initiatives which aim to support and develop arts businesses. “I think the stuff we’ve done around cultural leadership, for example, is a recognition now that we have got to build the capacity of arts organisation”, she says. [[arts organisations shouldn’t build complete dependence on public funding – they should see themselves as social enterprises]]

Pruning the tree

Most of all, however, Hodge has been in the news for her review of DCMS regional structures, resulting in the announcement that the Regional Cultural Consortiums (RCCs) are to be wound up by the end of this year. “When I came into the DCMS, I was quite taken aback that with a relatively small budget, we spent so much on a whole plethora of regional organisations.” She points to the regional structures of all four key non-departmental bodies (NDBs): Arts Council England, English Heritage, the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council and Sport England. In addition, both the Heritage Lottery Fund and the UK Film Council have regional structures in place. Actually within this range of regional structures, she says “we were very ineffective at influencing regional strategies – getting arts strategy as part of the regional strategy… [we are] ineffective at securing the importance of culture in Local Area Agreements. Part of the diversity of funding actually is entirely dependent on Arts Council [England] money to secure resources from Regional Development Agencies and Local Authorities.” She also admits, “I wanted to cut the bureaucratic structure – the talking shops – and get the action going.” She praises the RCCs for doing “a really good job” but seems to see their loss as clearing the way to get the NDBs to work together. She will be monitoring the results herself – including how much money is saved and redirected to frontline resources.

Banana skin?

And yet, does this harnessing of the energies of the NDBs, including ACE, represent a centralisation and a by-passing of the arm’s length principle? Hodge is adamant that she is a defender of the principle and that Labour ministers are “all firm, firm believers” in it. She even gets in a dig at David Cameron, who she fears would be keener to control the way funding is distributed, should he get to power. Hodge seizes on McMaster as her defence, citing the move towards peer assessment and away from the target culture as proof that government plans to stay out of funding decisions. I point out that some of McMaster’s ideas are seen as “a bit bonkers” by some in the arts sector, particularly the ‘free week’. “Well I think views differ on that – there are a great variety of views,” she answered rather hurriedly. (Well, true: about 99% think that particular idea is bonkers, and 1% thinks it’s great – almost all of whom are either in Parliament or work for the DCMS.)

I’m left with the impression of a minister whose personal love of and participation in the arts translates into a real desire to support the sector. However, it remains to be seen whether any politician can truly grasp the realities of the arts as a profession.