Joe Robertson

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Furniss. I congratulate the hon. Member for Halesowen (Alex Ballinger) on securing this important debate on the UK town of culture competition. Let me begin by welcoming the announcement of the UK town of culture programme. The UK city of culture initiative, first launched in 2009, is now in its fifth iteration and has supported places such as Derry/Londonderry, Hull, Coventry and most recently Bradford. In each case, the investment has proved to drive regeneration, attracting investment and visitors, all while showcasing the unique character, heritage and creativity of those places. Hull’s year as city of culture generated an estimated £300 million for the local economy, attracted millions of visitors and created thousands of jobs, apprenticeships and freelance opportunities. Coventry saw renewed confidence and investment, while in Bradford, more than 5,000 events took place during the year, with around 51 million spent. Within the first six months of Bradford 2025, more than 11,000 schoolchildren benefited from the education programme, and 40,000 local people participated in cultural events. My colleagues visited Bradford during that year to join in one of 5,000 events that took place. The success of this scheme shows how well-funded support can have a transformative impact. The UK town of culture rightly recognises that smaller and medium-sized settlements have powerful cultural stories to tell—we have heard a great variety of those today—and a vital role to play in our national life. Market towns such as Shrewsbury have long acted as bridges between rural and urban communities, serving as hubs for seasonal celebrations, sport, county dance and local trade. In my constituency on the Isle of Wight, our island’s towns are increasingly recognised as destinations for film and the creative industries. We have vibrant organisations, including Ventnor Exchange, Monkton Arts and the new Department venue in Ryde, plus of course Brading Roman Villa. Shanklin theatre, a historic building, survives only through the tireless volunteer efforts of local people. I enjoyed the local pantomime “Dick Whittington” there only last week with my children. Building on the success of the city of culture programme, the ambition to break down barriers to opportunity, drive local economic growth and create jobs is one that we strongly support. However, the last iteration of the city of culture competition demonstrated that the scheme could be open to places beyond cities, with examples including Wrexham, which bid as a town, and County Durham, which submitted a bid covering the entire county. Wrexham even became a city midway through its bid. This shows that the programme could already accommodate a broader range of places, without necessarily creating a town of culture competition separately. It raises the question: is it necessary to establish a separate competition when towns were allowed to bid in the last round? Experience from the previous city of culture competition shows that the places that performed best were those with strong local authority leadership and capacity. The most recent competition, with 20 entrants, was the largest ever. Although expertise is spreading across local government, not every council starts from the same place.