Hodge’s report to Arts Council England: ‘Not exactly a roaring endorsement’ | Arts Council England

Underfunded, the arts in England have been hit by Covid-19 from which many organizations have yet to recover. But that was only part of the story. The enormous burden of filling out the required forms, the endless bureaucracy, and the simply unwieldy long time it takes He is Funded by Arts Council England (ACE) it has caused global frustration among those working in the arts. There is a lot of talk about burnout and burnout.

Many organizations have also been frustrated by the limitations imposed by ACE’s pioneering strategy, ‘Let’s Create’, which, although admirable in principle, with its focus on engagement with the arts, may be skewed away from recognizing the expertise and uniqueness of artists and arts institutions. Especially in classical music and opera – where Ess made crude interventions in the direction of the art form – the body was widely condemned for exceeding its powers. As with many things in life, opinion depends on your perspective. Funding was transferred to disadvantaged areas and grassroots organizations outside the South East. Not surprisingly, those who received support for the first time were more likely to turn to ACE than those whose funding was reduced or cut.

The report for Arts Council England, by Margaret Hodge, a Labor peer and former arts secretary, urges a fire on red tape. That would be welcome. More controversially, it also recommends merging Let’s Create, a 10-year strategy aimed at taking ACE to 2030, in favor of a simpler strategy that allows organizations to advance based on their own strengths, rather than endlessly hammering square pegs into round holes.

With Hodge’s language of “excellence and achieving excellence,” those with long memories may recall Brian McMaster’s 2008 report, Supporting Excellence in the Arts, which similarly urged an end to deception and a revival of trust in artists and arts organizations. Those with longer memories may remember the Regional Arts Councils, which were abolished in 2001 in order to streamline Arts Council operations. Hodge proposes reviving a version of these bodies – once condemned as wasteful – in order to strengthen regional decision-making, but without handing powers over to the political control of metro mayors. (On the other hand, important bodies at national and international levels will remain within the scope of the central ACE process, which may cause some friction.)

There is often a feeling with the Arts Council that it rolls in one direction for a few years, then gets pulled back in the opposite direction, before the whole cycle begins again. Another revival of an old success would be to recommend restarting something like the old Creative Partnerships programme, which, between 2002 and 2011, brought local artists into schools.

The report contains some sensible ideas to help close the funding gap in the arts, without simply demanding more money from the Treasury, which is unlikely to happen in the current climate. This includes extending existing tax breaks for touring (arts organizations like these tax breaks – they are straightforward and incentivize simply making things and doing them without adding all sorts of additional prescriptions). Ideas to encourage philanthropy include increasing tax breaks for donors outside London (the vast majority of donations to the arts are in the south-east).

The report is not a blatant endorsement of Arts Council England as it stands now: get rid of the bureaucracy! Throttle your strategy! However, England has not addressed the most disastrous reason behind the decline in arts funding: the collapse of local authority support. (Although the report recommends that local authorities should at least be empowered to develop a cultural strategy.) But Hodge insists that Arts Council England is the appropriate body for providing public funding for the arts and must continue to exist. It strongly emphasizes its most central and fundamental principle, which is that it must be remote from government and protected from political interference.