Ned O'Sullivan (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Will the Leader arrange for the Minister, Deputy Catherine Martin, to come before the House for a debate on the many arts and literary festivals that take place around the country? I would like to hear from the Minister on the growing problems with issues of governance and control that have begun to limit the creative freedom and the level of community involvement in some of these events. In recent years we have seen a serious and very necessary tightening up in governance procedures in every walk of life. We know the reasons for that. However, there is increasing evidence that overemphasis on governance issues is leading to a paralysis in creative thinking on many boards, particularly those in which the arts are concerned. The effect is that local endeavour is being chilled and local involvement diminished. Listowel Writers' Week, with which I am familiar, is an internationally renowned festival. Its model has been adopted as a template for similar festivals throughout the country. It is now in its 52nd year. It was the intention of its founders who included our local internationally renowned authors, Dr. Bryan MacMahon and Dr. John B. Keane, that the festival would be devised, organised and managed by the community of Listowel. There was to be no éirí in airde, no intellectual snobbery and no exclusivity about Listowel Writers' Week. That is why it has succeeded. This has been the secret of its success for more than half a century. Recently, however, this community-based model has come under threat with a proposal that an excellent representative committee be abolished and that Listowel Writers' Week henceforth be run by a very small, exclusive board of directors with the help of a paid curator. I need not state the reaction to this proposal in Listowel and in the wider world of literature. It has been one of shock and horror. I do not believe the Minister would wish to see community involvement replaced by small, exclusive boards that would have no answerability and no rapport with people on the ground. The arts will never flourish in the culture of the closed shop. I look forward to the Minister coming in to discuss these matters.