Delfont Mackintosh redundancy plan highlights government creative industries failure

Bectu has called on the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport to end its inertia on the crisis hitting the creative industries during the coronavirus pandemic.

The need for a government rescue package for the arts was brought into focus as major West End theatre chain Delfont Mackintosh announced it was consulting staff about redundancy plans.

Responding to the news head of Bectu Philippa Childs said: “Delfont Mackintosh’s decision to start redundancy consultation is catastrophic for London’s West End and the entire theatre industry.

“Bectu worked extremely hard to make sure that staff were furloughed under the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme (CJRS) when it first launched.

“We are now seeing theatres choosing to stop using the scheme, which the government claims is saving jobs, as a direct result of the changes to the CJRS announced by the Chancellor a fortnight ago because of the contributions that employers have to make from August.

“The government’s total lack of understanding of the issues facing the creative industries is disastrous and damaging for the UK economy.

The news follows on from DCMS select committee hearing on Tuesday 9 June.

The committee heard evidence from stakeholders about the impact of COVID-19 on theatres, musicians, music venues, the creative industries and the government’s response.

Committee chair Julian Knight, MP (Conservative, Solihull), asked culture minister Caroline Dinenage how the conversations between the  government and Treasury were going.

Her response was that conversations were ongoing and were looking at a range of different measures.

 No date

Dinenage said that with the Treasury, the DCMS was looking at rescue, recovery and renewal, but was unable to give a date when a package was expected.

Julian Bird, chief executive of UK Theatre, highlighted a survey by his organisation showing that 70% of UK theatres and production companies could run out of money by the end of the year.

Unless there was a change in government support for the sector, more theatres would be forced to make difficult decisions about their workforce to preserve themselves.

Damian Green MP (Conservative, Ashford) drew attention to the fact that countries like Germany provided money for cultural industries, and appeared to be taking them more seriously than the British government.

Dinenage replied that the government had been tackling one issue at a time.

Last week the committee chair Julian Knight wrote to culture secretary Oliver Dowden criticising the failure of the government to provide help for those left out of current income support packages.

He said: “It’s clear that the government needs to be doing much more to support the people in our creative industries who contribute so much to our national life but now find their livelihoods in jeopardy because they’re not eligible for government support schemes. It’s a matter of concern that ministers don’t have the figures on how many people in this sector find themselves without help.”

Culture secretary lacking influence

Childs added: “The Department of Digital, Culture, Media and Sport has been holding working groups, involving  Bectu , about returning to work. What it is failing to understand is that these conversations are currently irrelevant as so many organisations are about to close or their workforce will be made redundant – particularly those who are in some of the lowest paid roles.

“The decision from Delfont Mackintosh is yet another example of how badly the government is failing the creative industries.

“The culture secretary, Oliver Dowden, has sadly shown that he has little or no understanding of the needs of the sector and no influence with the Treasury. The Chancellor appears to believe a one-size fits all solution works – it doesn’t. The government urgently needs to re-assess its strategy for the creative industries.”