In Reading we have a ‘Lead Councillor for Culture and Sport’ – it used to be called ‘Arts and Leisure’, but ‘culture and sport’ was thought to be altogether classier. Leisure, after all is something that implies lazing around enjoying life. Taking it easy, having fun – and we can’t have any of that slacking can we?

‘Culture’, on the other hand, implies intellect, self-improvement, excellence; altogether more the sort of thing that Labour Britain should be about!

If you doubt me on this look up the words in a dictionary.

My mother, bless her cotton socks, regards ‘culture’ as something alien and highbrow – “not for the likes of us”.  She’s right. ‘Culture’ implies snobbery, which is why the term should be reserved for stuff that grows in a Petri dish.

Behind all this lies an obvious inequity. ‘Classical’ music, ‘serious’ theatre, opera, ballet and other minority entertainment consumed largely by the wealthy all survive on Benefits. It’s Shameless in a dicky bow, paid for through the lottery – the tax paid largely by the less well off. Minority interests of other sorts are supported on a smaller scale, but when it comes to supporting emerging talent in anything that might be regarded as ‘mainstream’ or ‘popular’ the politicians run a mile.

The passing last weekend of the Fez Club in its current form (and it remains to be seen what its new incarnation offers) diminishes the artistic/entertainment offering in Reading but it’s passing will just be one of those things – and there is genuinely little to be done when a commercial venture decides there is more money to be made by other activities.

Meanwhile, across the town centre, Sackville were exhibiting their plans for Station Hill. We are promised an Arts Centre that will “… host a range of activities that will appeal to, and be accessible to, a wide cross-section of local people”.

Don’t hold your breath folks. If ever there was a sentence crafted to appeal to the planners that is it. “A wide cross-section” can mean absolutely anything, but it doesn’t have to mean the majority and probably won’t. And “accessible” is just politically correct jargon. If the thing ever gets built – and that’s a big if –  there will be no place for the hoi-polloi. Call me a cynic, but I can’t see Sackville wanting to sully their shiny buildings with bingo players, line dancers or hoodie people.

The most effective institutions promoting live entertainment in Britain over the past century in terms of the numbers they reached have been the Northern Clubs. They provided a circuit that enabled countless entertainers to learn their craft, places for people to enjoy themselves and to enjoy company rather than stare at a screen in silence.

But like anything else that failed to evolve, the clubs are now, I’m told, in decline in their heartlands. However easy to satire and deride, I fail to see why these institutions are less worthy of support from the taxpayer than the local chamber orchestra. I see little on our estates in Reading that provides the social cohesion and collective leisure provision that the northern clubs did – diverse, accessible, politically correct community centres appealing to “a wide cross section” certainly don’t.

The most refreshing art exhibition I’ve been to this year was a gallery that had simply invited people to exhibit – first come first on the wall. It was well attended too.
Whatever councils, governments or philanthropists provide will be sterile so long as the patronising desire to ‘improve’ minds drives their thinking. What performers and artists really need is spaces and stages – an intelligent public policy would work with the private sector to ensure that places like the Fez don’t end up as Pizza Hut.