Labour and Co-operative MP Alice Macdonald has backed a call for a £60 million matched capital fund to support independent, not-for-profit regional theatres over the next five years.
The Norwich North MP is supporting a Budget proposal from the Regional Independent Theatre Alliance, which brings together six charitable regional theatres including Norwich Theatre Royal. The alliance is asking for £12 million a year to help venues modernise their buildings, improve accessibility, reduce energy costs and expand their capacity to earn income.
Alice Macdonald: 'A third way'
Alice Macdonald said the model offers "a third way alongside the publicly subsidised and commercial theatre sectors, combining a strong public and charitable purpose with the financial discipline and entrepreneurial approach needed to operate at commercial scale".
Alliance members are charities which reinvest their surpluses in their programmes and communities while meeting day-to-day running costs through earned income rather than ongoing public subsidy. Crucially, the fund would not pay for day-to-day operations: money would go to capital projects, be released against evidenced plans and delivery milestones, and be designed to unlock additional private, commercial and charitable investment.
'Engines of growth'
Figures from the alliance's five founding members show they generate more than £83 million in annual income, support over £27 million in local supply-chain spending and bring an estimated £54.4 million of audience spending into their local economies each year.
Alice Macdonald, whose mother ran the local arts centre in King's Lynn, said that spending supports restaurants, pubs, hotels, transport providers and local suppliers well beyond the theatre doors, and argued that independent charitable theatres are poorly served by existing capital funding even when they have a strong track record.
She said the proposal fits Labour's ambitions for devolution and regional growth. The fund is a request from the sector ahead of the Budget and is not yet government policy.
