Maurice Cummins (Fine Gael)

I welcome the Minister to the House. Since the foundation of the State, only two Arts Acts have been enacted, in 1951 and 1973. In all probability the Bill before us today, the Arts Bill 2002, will be the only opportunity this House will have to assist and to encourage the development of the arts through legislation for a generation.

Rather than being called an Arts Bill it would be more appropriate to call it an Arts Council Bill because the majority of its contents deal with the functions, membership and staffing of the Arts Council. While these points are very important, the arts community wants continuity and certainty as regards funding and support for its organisations, as opposed to a Bill which seems more tilted towards further bureaucracy than evoking a vision for the future of the arts in Ireland.

As mentioned by the Minister, the initial contents of the Bill have been watered down considerably. Various recommendations were made towards a new framework and review of arts legislation in the discussion paper first published in 2000 that went out to all interest groups. The large number of recommendations and questions raised therein were certainly not included in this Bill. One questions the need for reports at all, when the majority of them seem to gather dust and their recommendations are forgotten. I speak of the report compiled by Theo Dorgan on submissions received in response to Towards a New Framework for the Arts, a report backed by PricewaterhouseCoopers in the Strategic Review of the Arts Plan 1995 to 1998; The Creative Imperative, a report on support of individual artists in Ireland; and a report on the music industry. Most of the recommendations contained in these reports are not contained in the Bill.

The Bill also deals with the Minister's powers and the role of local authorities in so far as they affect the arts. The local authorities have an important role to play in promoting and stimulating public interest in the arts and they should be supported more, especially in terms of funding. How are local authorities to respond to massive cuts in their funding from the Arts Council this year?