| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
Mr. Efford: How many people have visited Cambridge university in the past four days?
Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I encourage the hon. Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin) not to provoke a sedentary debate.
Mr. Letwin: I am grateful for your admonition, Mr. Deputy Speaker, but I fear that, if the hon. Member for Eltham believes that the measure of a great university is the number of people who visit it, he is subject to exactly the problem that has afflicted the debate, and afflicts the Government's understanding of this object.
In a great university, we also think of the future in a certain way. We think of it as something that is not disconnected from the past, but is continuous with it. In a great university, what is passed on is not merely the heritage of the past but the foundation of the future. A culture is seen as something that comes from the past and goes to the future, understands the past and the present, and provides the basis for an understanding of the future.
All those aspects are entirely missing from the confection that is the dome. No Labour Member has remotely attempted to defend it this evening in cultural terms. The Secretary of State had an ample opportunity. I remind the House that he is the Secretary of State for, among other things, culture. He made a remarkable speech, which contained not a word about our culture and not a single attempt to defend the expenditure of £750 million on an object with no cultural value whatever.
Ms Ward: First, the £758 million that was spent was not public money. Secondly, the hon. Gentleman should have made his remarks during the education debate that took place earlier. If he wants to consider the contents of the Dome, I suggest that he goes and looks for himself, rather than criticising from a position of no knowledge at all.
Mr. Letwin: I shall resist the temptation to explain to the hon. Lady the degree to which, were I to visit the dome, my future actions might be impeded by the depression that I would encounter. Let me respond to her other point. Does she really believe that a world exists in which we ought to forget about culture because we should not concern ourselves with anything that has only £400 million of strictly public money, and should pay no attention to the fact that a great part of the Government's efforts was devoted to raising another £300-odd million, which could have been devoted to raising that £300 million in addition to the £400 million of public money for one of our great universities? If she thinks that
a world exists in which we should not attend to any of that because only £400 million of public money was spent, her conception of culture, and of the state's relationship to it, is different from mine.The odd thing is that, until prompted by my remarks, the hon. Lady did not even mention that. There she was, another Labour Member, making an eloquent speech--excellent, as always--but uttering not a word about the purpose of this thing. Apparently, it was visitor attraction.
It is sad--I mean it genuinely, not in a partisan spirit--when a nation has been so corrupted, perhaps alas in part by the rhetoric of the present Government, although not wholly, that it begins to think that it is reasonable to spend as much money as would keep a great university going in perpetuity on an item that is so entirely vacuous that its defenders do not have a word to say on its behalf in cultural terms.
Mrs. Joan Humble (Blackpool, North and Fleetwood): May I advise the hon. Gentleman that, on 14 January, I joined 640 young people who had travelled from Blackpool to visit the dome? They thoroughly enjoyed its educational value, the spectacular show there and the zones. Every one to whom I spoke wanted to come back, thoroughly enjoyed it and benefited in both educational and cultural terms. They also enjoyed coming to the capital, which many of my constituents have never done.
Mr. Letwin: I close my remarks on a note that the hon. Lady prompts. I am sure that she is right. I am sure that what she describes could be replicated manyfold. I am sure that many children and even perhaps some adults much enjoyed the experience. I have no doubt that they would much enjoy many other things. Had they come to a football match, visited the tower of London, walked around and seen the pigeons in Trafalgar square, they would have had a pleasant day. If she really believes, when she reflects on it, that the nation should spend £750 million to celebrate the millennium by giving some schoolchildren a pleasant day out, her conception of what a Government preoccupying themselves with the cultural necessities of our nation means, is, I regret to say, shallow.
We have a responsibility in the House to ensure that our Government do not celebrate a millennium in so superficial a fashion. That is what has happened. It will be a matter of regret for some decades and perhaps centuries. People will look back at the dome and see in it a symbol of the shallowness of a culture that has been corrupted.
9.32 pm
Mr. Roger Godsiff (Birmingham, Sparkbrook and Small Heath): I know that time is short, so I will contain my comments to a few points.
I speak as someone who lives, in my London home, close to the dome. More relevantly, I also speak as Member of Parliament representing the centre of Birmingham. Those Members who were here before the last election will be aware that Birmingham was one of the cities that bid for the central millennium festivities. It was the right hon. Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine), along with his colleagues, who, for understandable reasons, decided that those festivities should take place at Greenwich.
It is interesting. If Members read Hansard, they will find that, when the right hon. Gentleman, then Deputy Prime Minister, made the decision about which bid should be successful and defended it in the House, not one Member who is now sitting on the Opposition Benches criticised his decision then, or subsequently.
Mr. Patrick McLoughlin (West Derbyshire): Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Godsiff: Forgive me. Time is short.
When my hon. Friend the Member for Watford (Ms Ward) refers to political opportunism, she makes a valid point.
The reason why I mention Birmingham is because, as a consolation prize, Birmingham got one of the big projects from the Millennium Commission: Millennium Point, a futuristic science park that will enormously benefit the people of Birmingham and stand for many years as a testament to that great city. Many people in Birmingham would say that that £50 million was a better prize than the original prize of getting the central festivities.
I have been to the millennium dome and it is an interesting day out.
Mr. Pound: As bad as that, eh?
Mr. Godsiff: I shall ignore that remark.
I do not get carried along by the hype. I have never believed that the dome ranks with the Taj Mahal as one of the great wonders of the world. However, it is an interesting building.
I am sure that the Government are aware of the public concern. Those who have been to the dome often come away with the feeling that there is an unresolved clash of themes: the understandable commercial theme of the sponsors, who want to push their brands, and the theme of the artists, who are trying to project something relating to Britain's past and its future. I have had the pleasure to go to Disneyland and, more importantly, to the Epcot centre next door--the futuristic science theme museum and park. The dome is not a Disneyland or an Epcot centre. I regret to say that many people say after visiting the dome that it is really just a pumped-up trade show.
That is sad, because it undermines many of the successes that the dome has brought to the area, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Eltham (Mr. Efford) referred. That part of London, which I know well, has greatly needed the vast amounts of public expenditure. The money that has gone into the infrastructure will bring lasting benefits to the community. I have no doubt that whatever succeeds the dome will stand the test of time. The money that has been spent will be recouped and we can be proud of what we have put there. It is just sad that the clash of cultures and themes could not have been resolved before the dome was opened.
9.37 pm
Mr. Christopher Fraser (Mid-Dorset and North Poole): This has been a short debate, long waited for by the Conservatives. My hon. Friend the Member for East Surrey (Mr. Ainsworth) set out the mishaps surrounding the project and the Government interference that has
dogged it. Unlike the Secretary of State, I shall restrict my comments to the dome and not drift off to other issues. The hon. Member for Lewes (Mr. Baker), as ever, asked the Government many questions that remain unanswered. My hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Mr. Letwin) made some telling and intellectual observations on culture and the history of this country.Some hon. Members have pointed out that the project was conceived by the Conservative Government. My right hon. Friend the Member for Henley (Mr. Heseltine) confirmed the purpose of the project. He articulated why the dome was to be built and portrayed the philosophy that the previous Government believed would be at the heart of the dome and what it would stand for--an image of a country at the forefront of cultural, artistic, engineering and scientific activity and attainment. It was to be about a sense of unity, bringing the nation together, and the regeneration of a derelict and contaminated area of London. That was my right hon. Friend's vision, embraced by the Select Committee on Culture, Media and Sport and by hon. Members on both sides of the House. It was not a concept that should divide Members.
The noble vision of all that is best of British was destroyed when the Millbank machine took control and the Labour party decided to make the millennium dome a symbol of new Labour. Ever since the Labour Government finally proclaimed that they would, after all, allow the dome to continue, political interference has dogged the project. If proof were needed of the Government's determination to interfere with the project, as my hon. Friend the shadow Secretary of State has said, it was found in the appointment of the right hon. Member for Hartlepool (Mr. Mandelson), Labour's Mr. Fixit, known colloquially as the Dome Secretary. There is a wealth of evidence of the Government's interference in the millennium dome project. That has been nothing but detrimental to the success of what should have been a national celebration and an object of pride.
If new Labour could not come up with five meaningful election pledges, how could it possibly have been expected to come up with 14 meaningful dome zones? If only the Government had left NMEC and its chosen advisers to get on with the finer details, how much more inspired the zones and the whole experience could have been.
Perhaps the most troubled zone has been the faith zone, which was in true politically correct fashion renamed "faith zone" because the word "the" was thought to imply that only one faith--Christianity--was to be celebrated. It has been the target of much criticism from the Church of England, as a symbol of all that is wrong with the dome itself. On many occasions, we have said that the Government's mantra is one of style before substance; in this case, it is style before content.
The hon. Member for Watford (Ms Ward), who serves with me on the Select Committee, summed it up:
- "It is a little like Cadbury's developing a wrapper without actually deciding what the chocolate bar is going to be."
| Next Section
| Index | Home Page |