Jack Gamble is director and CEO of Campaign for the Arts, closely connected with the perspectives of audiences and the wider public. He highlighted the positive cultural engagement data aggregated in The State of the Arts report that he co-authored.

According to the report, 91% of adults in England engaged with the arts in person between October 2022 and December 2023, and 77% attended events. Despite this strong demand, the supply side has shrunk. Across all venues, there were fewer events in 2023 than in 2018 with a 23% fall in the number of music, theatre, dance and comedy events in the UK.

Jack struck a chord, highlighting the ticking timebomb of the decline of creative arts in the school curriculum, which is already impacting the creative pipeline and reducing diversity in the workforce to historically low levels.