Labour Party Manifesto 2010 Creative Britain: active and flourishing communities Communities and creative Britain
The challenge for Britain
To build on the renaissance that British sport, culture and the arts have enjoyed in the last decade in the new climate of financial restraint. The voluntary and community sector has a new lease of life, but needs its potential to be fully harnessed. The Tories have always neglected the arts and sport, regarding them as an easy target for cuts.
The next stage of national renewal
* A golden decade of sport with the 2012 Olympics as a great national and world-wide celebration.
* Registered Supporters Trusts enabled to buy stakes in their club bringing mutualism to the heart of football.
* Operational independence for major museums and galleries, with more lottery funding returning to the arts, sport and culture after 2012.
• Protection for the post offices and pubs on which
community life depends.
• The BBC’s independence upheld; and Britain equipped with a world-leading digital and broadband infrastructure.
The sporting, artistic and cultural life of Britain is rich and diverse, internationally renowned, and as vital to our quality of life as it is to our national prosperity. Since 1997, our creative industries, arts and sport have become the envy of the world. As the 2012 Olympics draw near, we will make the most of our place in the world’s spotlight to showcase Britain, getting more people playing sport and attracting more visitors to the UK.
Culture and the arts are vital to a modern economy. But they stand for more than material success, reminding us that society is not just a marketplace. Promoting well-being means sustaining the community institutions that we most cherish, and protecting those areas of our public life that embody the common good.
2012: creating an Olympic generation
Hosting the 2012 Olympics provides a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to showcase our country’s great sporting talent. The eyes of the world will be on us as Team GB inspires enthusiasm and national pride. Our aim is to achieve outstanding medal success at the Olympics and Paralympics, with a talent development system striving for excellence, and successful British athletes spanning all disciplines and events.
The Games will deliver a golden legacy for future generations, ushering in a new era of sporting excellence. The Olympics are already inspiring a new generation of British volunteers: over a quarter of a million young people have signed up to help run the Games.
We will ensure that the Olympics are delivered on time and on budget, to the highest standards. Britain will be the first Olympic hosts to create a world-class sports system, from elite level to the grass roots.
The impact of the Olympics will be felt throughout the country, helping to boost the UK tourist industry.
Sport for All
We approach 2012 with a proud record. Investment in sport has increased eightfold. We have begun a renaissance of competitive sport in our schools, investing as never before in our sporting facilities. Taking part in sport uncovers talent, improves physical fitness, and encourages important social skills. We are providing more resources to give every child the opportunity to do at least five hours’ sport per week. This will be provided through extended schools, community sports clubs and 3,000 new Olympic-inspired sports clubs. We will invest in a new national network of school sports coaches to increase the quality and quantity of coaching in some of the most deprived areas.
This will be backed by a Pupil Guarantee ensuring that every pupil should have access to regular competitive sport along with coaching, a choice of different sports, and pathways to elite and club development. We will continue our investment in free swimming for children and the over-60s. People of all ages and abilities can apply to join one of the tens of thousands of sports clubs receiving public funding. And there are over half a million more adults taking part in regular sporting activity than a decade ago.
Protecting the integrity of professional sport is vital: we will toughen measures to combat cheating and the use of illegal substances in sport. We will work with governing authorities to ensure that professional clubs are accountable to their stakeholders, and run transparently on sound financial principles, with greater involvement of local communities and supporter representation. Sports governing bodies will be empowered to scrutinise takeovers of clubs, ensuring they are in the long-term interests of the club and the sport. We will develop proposals to enable registered Supporters Trusts to buy stakes in their club.
The 2010s promise to be a golden decade for British sport: as well as the 2012 Olympics, we will host the 2013 Rugby League World Cup, the 2014 Commonwealth Games, and the 2015 Rugby Union World Cup. We aim to bring more major international sporting competitions to Britain, beginning with our current partnership with the English FA to bring the 2018 World Cup to England.
Arts, culture and museums
We have made unprecedented investment in Britain’s cultural life, widening access by introducing free admission to museums and galleries. Every child and young person should be entitled to five hours of art, music and culture per week, through learning to play a musical instrument, visiting local museums and joining film clubs, or taking part in local theatre. Through Creative Partnerships we are ensuring that young people in the most deprived parts of the country are able to fulfil their artistic talents by working with local arts and cultural organisations.
We have provided the first nationwide programme of free theatre to young people; now we will build on the success of the National Theatre’s £10 Season to work with theatres and sponsors to provide reduced-rate tickets for theatrical productions around Britain. Our national cultural life and creative industries can prosper only by developing young artistic talent. Creative Bursaries will support the most artistically gifted young people in their early professional careers.
So that our cultural facilities remain world-class, charities, businesses and cultural organisations must collaborate more closely in the future. We will review how incentives for philanthropic support can be strengthened. Our major museums and galleries should be operationally independent of government, so we will legislate to ensure their managerial and financial autonomy.
We will maintain our commitment to free admissions, encouraging people of all ages and a wide range of backgrounds to visit. Every child will have lifetime library membership from birth. Britain is enriched by its unique historical heritage. We will review the structures that oversee English Heritage, putting mutual principles at the heart of its governance so that people can have a direct say over the protection and maintenance of Britain’s built historical legacy.
We will give public institutions new rights to borrow works of art from the national collection, so that more people can benefit from access to our national artistic heritage.
National Lottery funding is more in tune with people’s priorities than ever. We will promote greater public involvement in the way that National Lottery proceeds are spent on good causes. A proportion of Lottery funding is going to the Olympics. After 2012, this proportion will return to culture, heritage and sport.
Improving your community
The nature of the places in which we live matters enormously. We are happier, more engaged and better able to enjoy family life where there are safe and welcoming public spaces, good local amenities and buildings in which we can take pride.
Britain’s towns and cities have undergone a renaissance in the last decade. Our great cities have been rebuilt and revitalised and dilapidated schools and hospitals replaced with modern buildings. We will continue to promote excellence in architecture and design, helping to foster civic pride and build world-class places in which people want to live and work.
We have introduced new design standards for schools, to ensure the very best architecture and building design; we will extend these to all new government-funded building programmes.
Protecting community life
Strong community life also depends on protecting the places in which people come together. To give families access to good recreational facilities, we are investing £235 million to create new or refurbished play spaces and adventure playgrounds. We will protect the Post Office network, so that it can fulfil its historic role as a trusted institution serving the community.
The local pub and social club are also hubs of community life. Too many pubs have closed that could have been sustained by local people. We will support pubs that have a viable future with a new fund for community ownership in 2010-11. Councils must take full account of the importance of pubs to the local community when assessing proposals that change their use, and we will make it more difficult to demolish pubs.
Restrictive covenants applied by pub companies to property sales will be curbed and flexibility for pubs to provide related services promoted, making it easier to have live entertainment without a licence. A non-tie option should be available for pub tenants; we will act if the industry fails to make progress on this.
To protect the character of their areas, local authorities now have greater powers to reject applications for lap-dancing clubs and we will give councils new powers to oppose gambling licences if there are too many betting shops operating in a high street. The ‘cleaner neighbourhoods’ legislation will be used to clamp down on litter, fly-tipping and vandalism. We will extend the use of participatory budgeting to give local people a stronger say. Community Land Trusts enable local people to purchase and run local amenities and assets in their area such as youth facilities, parks and open spaces. We will promote the transfer of buildings and land to the ownership or control of voluntary and community groups.
Supporting social enterprise
The Social Investment Bank will make additional capital available to social enterprises with an initial endowment of £75 million funded by dormant accounts alongside existing funding streams. We will promote the creation of more social enterprise hubs in every community – helping more to get off the ground.
We will extend the right of public-sector workers to request that they deliver frontline services through a social enterprise. Public-sector workers in the NHS currently enjoy this right. We will extend this to more public services, including social care, with greater community involvement in their governance.
The new mutualism
There is growing interest in co-operative and mutual organisations that people trust, and that have the capacity to unleash creativity and innovation, creating new jobs and services – particularly in disadvantaged neighbourhoods where traditional approaches have failed in the past. We want to see more local organisations run on cooperative principles with an expansion of Community Interest Companies and third-sector mutual organisations that reinvest profits for the public good. We will promote this through the Co-operative Party, Business Link, enterprise education and the Regional Development Agencies. To give more people a stake in a highly valued national asset, British Waterways will be turned into a mutually owned co-operative. We will promote the use of community shares that support investment in football clubs, pubs, renewable energy and shops.
A vibrant voluntary sector
Britain has among the highest levels of voluntary membership in the world. We strongly value the independence of the voluntary and community sector, including its campaigning role, and will act to maintain it. There will be greater support for third-sector organisations in competing for public-sector contracts, ensuring there is a level playing field with the public and private sectors. We will consult on putting the Compact Commission – which sets guidelines for effective partnership working between government and the third sector in Britain – on a statutory footing, and ensure greater support for the Compact at local level.
All young people should be active and engaged in their communities, so that it becomes a normal part of growing up to undertake service in the community. We are taking forward plans for a National Youth Community Service, with the goal that all young people contribute at least 50 hours to their communities by the age of 19, building on citizenship education and community engagement in schools.
Faith is enormously important to millions of people in Britain, shaping their values and the way they live. We respect the importance of belief and welcome the contribution that people of faith make to our communities and society more widely. We will actively combat extremist groups who promote fear, hatred and violence on the basis of faith or race.
Britain’s creative industries
In every nation and region of Britain a wealth of creative talent – in industries ranging from film to fashion, design and video games – has flourished, and creative industries now account for ten per cent of the national economy.
The strength of Britain’s film industry is a source of pride.
Through Labour’s film tax credit we have ensured that Britain – with its unique range of skills and facilities – is the right place to invest in film production. So that films can be enjoyed more widely too, we will maintain the film tax credit and create a merged British Film Institute and UK Film Council to establish a single body to promote film production and film heritage.
Subject to state aid clearance, we will introduce a tax relief for the UK video games industry.
We will support film festivals around the country, and establish a new biennial Festival of Britain, beginning in 2013, showcasing our major cultural achievements and young British talent across all of our creative industries.
The BBC is the most admired and trusted broadcaster in the world: respected internationally for its objectivity and its creative excellence, and here in Britain as a pillar of our cultural life. We support an independent and world-class BBC at the heart of a vibrant public broadcasting system. Our strong support for its editorial independence and the licence fee that finances
the BBC’s programmes and activities will continue. The BBC Trust should fully involve the public in decision-making. The licence-fee is guaranteed for the ten-year Royal Charter that took effect on 1 January 2007.
Channel 4 will continue as a public-service broadcaster providing distinctive competition to the BBC, alongside ITV and Channel 5. We are committed to maintaining plurality in regional news provision. We will fund three regional news programme pilots from the digital switchover under-spend in the current licence-fee period.
The digital revolution is transforming the world of broadcasting. We are working with the BBC and Digital UK to ensure that TV’s digital switch-over takes place smoothly by 2012, providing financial support and helping elderly people and the most vulnerable households in the UK. To ensure we preserve competition and protect children and consumers on the Internet, we will safeguard the independence of Ofcom.
We are extending broadband access to every business and home, ensuring universal access within a decade to high-speed broadband across the country. We will update the intellectual property framework that is crucial to the creative industries – and take further action to tackle online piracy.
Labour Manifesto 2010
Labour Manifesto 2010 : Introduction
Labour Manifesto 2010 : Building the high-growth economy of the future
Labour Manifesto 2010 : Prosperity for all not just a few
Labour Manifesto 2010 : Excellence in education: every child the chance to fulfil their potential
Labour Manifesto 2010 : World-leading healthcare: a patient-centred NHS The challenge for Britain
Labour Manifesto 2010 : Strengthening our communities, securing our borders
Labour Manifesto 2010 : Supporting families throughout life
Labour Manifesto 2010 : A green future for Britain
Labour Manifesto 2010 : A new politics: renewing our democracy and rebuilding trust
Labour Manifesto 2010 : Meeting the challenges of the new global age
