Memorandum submitted the Lyric Theatre
We would ask the Committee to consider the following
when undertaking its enquiry into the nature and adequacy of public
support for theatre in Britain:
1. The £25 million funding increase
that the theatre industry in England has enjoyed over the last
three years has had a dramatic and significant impact on the theatre
ecology in this country. It has, we believe, resulted in increases
in both the quality and quantity of theatre on offer to the public.
It has also transformed the financial state of many theatre companies,
saving many from imminent closure and ensuring that many more
are now viable, thriving businesses.
2. The Lyric Hammersmith's experience over
the last three years is instructive and, probably, not untypical.
In 2000-01, the Lyric's turnover was approximately £1.5 million
and the company had an accumulated deficit of just over £200,000.
The Lyric was weeks away from closure. By the end of 2003-04,
this position had been transformed. Turnover had increased to
more than £2.6 million and the Lyric now had accumulated
free reserves of almost £200,000. Expenditure on productions
had increased from £680,000 to £1.3 million and expenditure
on our education programme had increased from £11,000 to
£71,000 (with a doubling of our core education team from
two to four). Critically, thanks to our ability to invest more
in our work on stage, we have, we believe, been able to improve
the quality and ambition of our work with the result that we have
also seen a rise in annual attendance over the same period from
110,000 to 133,000 (and this has been accompanied by an even more
dramatic increase in participation in our education programme
from 900 in 2000-01 to 9,000 in 2003-04).
The reasons for this turnaround are largely
to do with increases in public funding—in the case of the
Lyric through a combination of one-off stabilisation funding and
a more than 40% increase in our Arts Council revenue grant. This
in turn has enabled us in turn to raise more money ourselves through
fundraising and the ticket office. The result is that the Lyric
has moved from a hand to mouth existence to an organisation engaged
in the strategic and long-term development of its infrastructure
and the artists who work within it with a view to creating an
innovative new theatre culture. We believe the Lyric is a model
of what increases in public subsidy can achieve—both in
terms of the quality and innovation of our work and in terms of
the broad social audience we attract here through our programme
of work on our stages and in the community.
3. We believe the recent decision by the
DCMS to freeze the Arts Council's grant in 2006-07 and 2007-08
is potentially disastrous—both in real terms and through
the signal it sends out. If the arts returns to an environment
in which below inflation grant increases are the norm, then it
is likely that most organisations will respond by cutting back
on those areas of their programme which carry most risk (and which
are therefore likely to be most innovative) in an attempt to protect
their core mission.
It is an astonishing decision, especially given
that the sums required to inflation protect the Arts Council's
grant (£30 million over two years), are so miniscule in Government
spending terms. Is the Government, having appeared to champion
the arts, now saying that the historic problems of underfunding
that the arts have faced in this country have now been solved?
If it can recognise that the historic problems of underfunding
in health and education can not be solved in two terms, why does
it not think the same argument applied to the arts? I thought
this Chancellor prided himself on moving away from a stop-start
approach to the economy.
What is even more depressing is the Government's
apparent surprise at the reaction of the arts community to its
decision. Why would they imagine that the arts community would
react any differently to the health service or the education sector
if the Government had announced standstill funding for these services?
Their surprise is perhaps revealing of this Government's true
attitude towards the arts—that its grant support is about
benevolent patronage rather than a vital investment in an important
sector of the British economy; a sector that also helps, critically,
to define this nation's sense of itself.
4. We believe that the last few years of
above inflation increases in grant aid for the theatre sector
have begun to show the potential of what a properly funded theatre
industry in this country could achieve. However, we believe that
rather than solving the problems of the theatre industry, these
year on year grant increases have begun to indicate how much there
is still to be done. We believe that a detailed cost benefit analysis
of what the theatre industry has achieved over the last few years
will make the economic and cultural case not for standstill funding
but for further increases in public funding for theatre and the
arts in general.
5. We would urge this committee to recommend
to the Government that it immediately finds the £30 million
required to inflation protect its grant in 2006-07 and 2007-08
in order to prevent any unpicking of the achievements of the last
three years. We also urge it to recommend to the Government to
commission a detailed analysis of the impact of the recent grant
rises in the theatre sector with a few to establishing a proper
needs analysis of the sector for the future.
14 January 2005
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