Email DCMS Secretary of State Michelle Donelan MP to reverse the ENO funding cut

Arts Council England (ACE) has announced that the English National Opera will no longer be a National Portfolio Organisation from April 2023. After a relocation fee over a three year period, the ENO will be forced to relocate from its current London Coliseum home to a location out of the capital city.

This move, and the other cuts announced, means London-based venues that are already too stretched will suffer further damage. This has real and destructive consequences for the thousands of freelancers who rely on such venues for work, many of whom now face the impossible decision of relocation or loss of income altogether.

Write to DCMS Secretary of State Michelle Donelan MP to let her know you agree that we need to protect cultural institutions like the ENO and the creative jobs at risk.

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Dear Secretary of State,
On Friday, Arts Council England (ACE) announced that the English National Opera will no longer be a National Portfolio Organisation from April 2023. After a relocation fee over a three year period the ENO will be forced to relocate from its current home, the London Coliseum, to a location out of the capital city, possibly Manchester.
I am writing to you to ask you to challenge this decision. Whilst I recognise the need for greater cultural offerings in all parts of the UK, as does the ENO, this will not be achieved by decimating a cultural institution of nearly 100 years’ standing, and the workplace of 300 permanent singers, musicians and technicians, from costume and wigs to make up, construction and prop makers. In addition, it threatens the livelihoods of several hundred freelancers every year.
Following two and a half years of Covid restrictions and in the midst of a cost-of-living crisis, London-based venues are already too stretched to face further funding cuts and relocations. This also has real and damaging consequences for the thousands of freelancers who rely on such venues for work, and now face the impossible decision of relocation or loss of income altogether. Increasing regional access to arts and culture is something that we must all strive for, but not at such devastating cost to individuals that have already suffered so much. 
The ENO defies the traditional view of an opera house. It has the most diverse full-time chorus in the country, and schemes in place to achieve the same goal for its orchestra, as well as using its public subsidy to provide Free Tickets for Under 21s and maintain an average ticket price of £65 – around a quarter of the price of a standard opera ticket elsewhere. Fifteen percent of its audience is aged under 35 – the youngest audience for opera anywhere in the country – and for the last four years, around fifty per cent of its audience has been first time opera goers.
During the pandemic, the ENO not only continued to perform work (such as La boheme to audiences safely socially-distanced in their cars, or on primetime Saturday night BBC 2) but also supported the NHS by launching ENO Breathe, a scheme which provides breathing training to sufferers of long-Covid. ENO Breathe is now available in more than 80 NHS Trusts around the country. Since September of this year, the ENO has already provided 5,000 school children with music training through ENO Finish This and every year over 165,000 people interact with its outreach and community programmes. Especially heartening are the “relaxed performances” for those with accessibility requirements – they always take place in the main auditorium (not the case with most opera houses), involve the full chorus and orchestra, and all tickets are £25. How better to demonstrate their founding mission of “opera for everyone”?
The ENO’s mainstage work is heralded around the world – their version of Philip Glass’ Akhnaten, a co-production with the Met, recently won a Grammy. Commercially, the ENO generates £2 of revenue for every £1 the Arts Council invest in it. Yet by forcing the ENO to reconfigure and reduce so drastically in such a short space of time, alongside many of the other proposed cuts to London theatres, the Arts Council and the Government risk initiating the loss of London’s status as the cultural capital of the world. A thriving capital is imperative for national success, and without such an established institution generating considerably more revenue than regional venues, cultural institutions across the country and the wider creative industries will suffer. 
I trust you will raise this as a matter of some urgency,

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