Join us at 6.30pm for live updates from the debate. In the meantime
there's more information here.
Hello there and welcome to the debate liveblog. My name's Chris and I'll be your host for the evening
The audience are just filing in to a fairly packed auditorium, we should be starting soon. I'll try to get the odd photo up on here too
If you're on Twitter you can use the #idfb2010 hashtag to chat amongst yourselves. I'll be pulling some of the tweets into this stream too
It'd be good to get some questions and reaction too - click 'Make a comment' at the top of this box
And we're off. Stuart Griffiths, Chief Executive of Birmingham Hippodrome is welcoming everyone
He references the soon-to-reopen mac and the launch of the Birmingham Arts Manifesto
Rosie Millard, chair of tonight's debate, has taken over and introduces the panel (http://www.rosiemillard.com)
First question to Ed Vaizey (Conservative)
www.theyworkforyou.comEd: in favour of free national museums and strong supporters of the 'mixed economy' - funding, commerical and philanthropy
Ed: considers arts most efficient of public services bearing in mind relatively small amount of spending
Ed: wants to give arts more independence from government
Ed: wants to see arts given more focus on leadership and innovation
Rosie passes the baton to Lord Clement-Jones (Lib Dem)
www.theyworkforyou.comC-J: curries favour by praising Birmingham's City of Culture bid
C-J: arts are an important part of the country's economy. Wants to strengthen DCMS. Committed to funding via Arts Council but wants to ensure regions get a 'better crack of the whip'
C-J: simplify Gift Aid and tweak Lottery funding to get more out of it. Free up schools curriculum and help teachers to use arts better
C-J: knows the key concern is around funding. Quotes Nick Clegg saying that no area is ring-fenced but arts will be supported
Rosie Millard: in her view politicians are quiet on the arts until election time
Rosie passes on to Siôn Simon
www.theyworkforyou.comSS: ducks talking about election policies (for now) to talk about Birmingham's industrial heritage
SS: many of the local organisations who contributed to the Birmingham Arts Manifesto are world class but we don't talk them up enough
SS: making clear that he is a 'city politician'. All that talk about him wanting to become Birmingham's first mayor probably isn't far off the mark
Rosie now passes on to Marc Reeves (http://www.thebusinessdesk.com/westmidlands/) who jokes about Siôn Simon launching his mayoral campaign here
MR: says he can be independent in this debate, not belonging to a particular party
MR: ties media and news into the creative industries - his particular area of interest
MR: calls out EV's party in not including mentions of the creative industries in the Tory manifesto
MR: highlights his own hypocrisy - as a consumer of the arts he would love more, but he also wants the country out of a recession as soon as possible
Turning questions over to the audience now
Dave Harte asks about the impact of digital on the creative industries. Essentially this is a question about the new Digital Economy Act
SS picks up this question. Describes it as a 'wide-ranging piece of legislation'
SS: Doesn't believe that a single individual will be stifled by the effect of the Digital Economy Act
C-J: problems with the DEA came in the final few months of the legislation's development. Recent report shows that 250,000 jobs between now and 2015 were at risk as a result of piracy
C-J: some technical elements of the legislation aren't quite right - temporary account suspension and site blocking provisions
Next question from the audience. Asking EV about Lottery funding and capital projects, esp the new venues that have been built without having a great idea about their ongoing usage
EV: a lot has been learnt around Lottery funding. Need to go back to it's core principles
SS: 'Ed is very pausible' getting back to 'party political malarkey'
SS: says he and Ed are old friends. If it was up to Ed then Tories wouldn't cut arts funding, but it's not up to Ed, it's up to George Osbourne
Chris
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