Charlotte Higgins makes a passionate case for creating more equal access to the arts for the cultural health of the nation (Arts funding has collapsed under 14 years of Tory rule. Here are three ways Labour can fix it, 19 March). As she rightly argues, the personal and civic benefits of the arts are enormous. Equally remarkable is the economic impact of the UK’s creative industries, which have grown at 1.5 times the rate of the wider economy for the past decade, generating more wealth than aerospace, the life sciences and automotive sectors combined.
That is why we need to nurture and protect the country’s pipeline of talent into the sector – ensuring that everyone not only has access to the arts, but also the opportunity to receive an arts education at university. This means widening access through maintenance grants, retaining the ability of overseas students to bring their talents to our shores and, more broadly, getting our higher education system on to a sustainable footing.
