Estelle Morris speech to Cheltenham Festival of Literature
I came to my previous Ministerial post with a fair amount of first hand knowledge and experience, and a background as someone who had delivered the service. The same can't be said of the Arts. Of course I read and have visited museums and galleries, the theatre and the cinema but, like so many people, that was when I wasn't working. It was a refuge, in some ways, from other parts of life.
I was a consumer, not a connoisseur.
And I am still listening and still learning, but what I wanted to do today was begin to set out how I hope to do the job.
As a citizen and a politician I've always seen why the Arts matter, both in their own right and as a way of allowing us to express our identity, our aspirations and our fears.
And I've always believed in the power of the best of Art and Culture to touch the lives of more people than it does at the moment. I hope I don't fall in to the trap of believing we have to choose between excellence and access.
Because to do so is to show a lack of faith in both Art and people.
I know from my time in education, and from what I've heard in the last four months, that there are those who think that the Arts and Creativity don't have the recognition they deserve, that they're not valued as much as they should be by politicians or others, and that they're not resourced enough. And when money or time gets short, they get squeezed out.
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My own view is that there is a growing appetite for the Arts.
· Museum admissions have soared. Not only in London, but in the Regions as well. Tate Modern, Baltic and Walsall attract the crowds in a way that just wasn't the case a decade ago.
· Classic FM confounds its critics by broadcasting serious classical music to new audiences.
· Thousands of people gather in outdoor stadia around the country to join in the Last Night of the Proms,
· Book Groups have sprung up in their thousands all over the country, where people from all walks of life use serious literature as a gateway to companionship and debate.
· And the rejoicing across Liverpool when it was awarded the title of Capital of Culture.
So there is much to celebrate. But if you ask me whether Arts and Creativity are properly recognised for the pivotal role they pay in communities, I think the answer is they are not yet.
My role as a politician is not to second guess those in the sector or to pretend I'm an expert. But it is to help build up the case for creativity and Arts and to argue for it whenever and wherever I can.
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But before I do that I want to comment on what I know has always been a lively debate in the sector – the excellence and access issue?
As I said a moment ago, it is not a choice we ever have to make. My whole political views are based on the belief that there is more talent, more skill and more ability in our people than we've ever managed to realise.
I don't believe that to achieve greater access, you have to compromise quality and reduce everything to the lowest common denominator. I didn't do that in education and I wouldn't support it in the Arts.
I unashamedly want to treasure and support the best of our Arts and Culture. Our leading galleries and museums, writers and artists are world leaders and we should be proud of that. Why, when we've enjoyed living in a country that can offer us The National Gallery, The Royal Ballet or Bridgewater Hall would we want to deny that excellence to future generations? We have a responsibility to make sure that excellence flourishes.
In many areas of our life though, there is a risk that we confuse excellence with elitism.
· Is it elitist to single out institutions as being excellent? Of course it isn't.
· But should more people have access to them? Of course they should.
· Is there an unwritten rule of life that says the more excellent a piece of Art, the fewer people will be able to appreciate it? Of course there isn't.
That's why access policies are important. I saw it with young people when Shakespeare became compulsory in all Secondary schools, and we see it at our National Museums and Galleries as the numbers visiting greatly increased once the obstacle of admission charges is swept away.
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We have made progress.
But our museums and galleries do have a responsibility to examine what they can do to remove artificial barriers. Whether it is how they arrange space, how they communicate, who they invite or quite simply how they describe the work. They should do it and they do. I have seen excellent practice in access, but the sector know that there is still more to be done.
When I visited the National Gallery to see the Madonna of the Pinks I also saw in a nearby room single parents from Waltham Forest modelling their own images as mother and child, inspired by what they had seen. Excellence and access side by side, neither dismissing the other.
But the art world is not the only one with responsibility on access. Many people who have art and creativity at the centre of their lives will have had the good fortune to have learned how to value it from their earliest days.
Access isn't just about opening the door a little wider. It is a greater challenge than that.
It is about giving people the skills and confidence to be comfortable with Art and to interpret it and enjoy it. It has to be learned and it can be taught. It begins in those early years, and at school, and goes on throughout life. We are not the first generation to try to improve access and we won't be the last.
Today I want to begin to explore what I think the case for Art and Culture might be. It's not a blueprint, it's not complete, but here are my reflections after just over four months in the job.
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First of all, it is an incredibly diverse sector. The National Gallery and the smaller Community Art Groups, classical music and rap are all part. Perhaps it is because of its diversity that the debate within the sector about it's own identity is so lively. I'm not sure that any other important sphere of national life has that debate.
Yet the argument for Art and Culture being at the centre of our national life is more urgent than ever before. What I know – and it was also the case during my days in education – is that it is difficult for Politicians to make the case for creativity in the way they are used to making cases.
We live in a political and an economic climate where we all want a return for public investment. Money spent, time used, priorities awarded, all have to have a return. That is not a problem. It's how it should be.
The problem of course comes in measuring the return. Target performance indicators, value added, evidence bases are all part of the language we've developed to prove our ability to deliver, to make progress to show a return and justify the public money that is used. I have no problem with that but much of this sector does not fit in to this way of doing things. I know that Arts and Culture make a contribution to health, to education to crime reduction, to strong communities to the economy and to the nation's well-being, but I don't always know how to evaluate it or describe it. We have to find a language and a way of describing its worth. It's the only way we'll secure the greater support we need.
I want to describe my three reasons for believing that Art and Creativity are more important now then there ever have been.
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Firstly, and at its simplest level, it gives us pleasure and a refuge from which the world can be considered in a different way. It is a personal resource for dealing with life. It gives people a different way of engaging with the world, and – at its best - new ways of thinking. We know what access to music can do for young children.
It's interesting that in our increasingly global world where we celebrate, quite rightly, our ability to travel to the other side of the world, and where we have removed many of the artificial barriers, that most of the world's conflicts seem to be about people wanting to have their own identifiable space, somewhere where they belong. The irony is that a global world makes it more important - not less - that individuals are confident about their place in it. Art and Culture gives people a way of expressing that individuality and it can give them the confidence to feel they are important and have a part to play. Look at how many neighbourhoods now put creativity at the centre of their regeneration. It was what was missing from re-generation in the 1960's and 1970's, but people know its importance now.
It is what can give us a civic and national identity, and can help us determine our place and contribution as the world becomes an ever-smaller place.
Secondly, the sector is undoubtedly an economic strength to our country. The creative industries account for 8.2 per cent of gross value added. It contributes £11.4 billion to our balance of trade. It employs 1.9 million people and it is growing at more than double the rate of the rest of the economy.
With an economic sector that is potentially this strong, we have to ask ourselves whether we're doing all we should to support it.
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Thirdly, and perhaps what make the sector so different from others, is the unique contribution it can make to other areas and to other sectors.
Creativity is becoming acknowledged as a key driver for economic growth and public service improvement. The last decade of the last century might have been about a technological revolution but the first years of this century are about a creativity revolution.
Employment trends tell us that creativity is at a premium. It's what gives companies an edge over their competitors. The reason one company thrive and another doesn't is it's ability to innovate. Whether we have an industrial base at all has always depended on the creativity of inventors. All the talk about a knowledge economy will only happen if we nurture creativity.
And creativity plays a huge role in public service reform. The difference between a good teacher and an average teacher is often that one is more creative than the other. As politicians we're asking the public services to find new solutions to old problems. That is asking them to be creative, to think outside the boundaries they've used to innovate, and to take risks. The challenge which faces us all – and which was something I worked on when I was Secretary of State for Education is how we encourage people in or public services to be creative and innovative at the same time as being accountable and showing a return for public investment. It can't be either or.
That's why I believe the arguments for creativity and innovation are more urgent than they have been. Creativity, innovation, risk taking are at a premium, and other sector are working at this to develop them. Yet they've always been at the centre of the Arts and Creativity sector. Other sectors strive for what this sector has at its core.
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That's the case I want to make in Government and elsewhere. I still have a lot to learn but I am finding plenty of good teachers in the sector! I've not much time to sit bemoaning that we are not understood. If we've got a story to tell and others don't hear it, we need to find a different way of telling it.
I want to be part of making the case for arts and creativity underpinning more of what we do.
But neither will I forget that there is something inherently good and valuable in art and creativity in its own right, that needs no justification other than the pleasure and fulfilment it gives people.
And if it is that important, it is worth making sure that as many people as possible benefit from it.
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