Rishi Sunak has announced today that a general election will be held on 4 July. Equity will make sure that arts funding is front and centre of the national agenda during the election campaign.
Arts funding has been decimated by years of austerity, arts education is in crisis, we must act now to save the arts and reverse these harmful cuts.
In the run up to the election we will aim to get every candidate on record by asking: Will they pledge to protect the arts, or won’t they?
Our demands to all election candidates are:
- Oppose cuts to existing funding and pledge to ring fence arts and entertainment funding.
- Require union contracts, terms and conditions for all public funding of the arts.
Ahead of the local council and Mayor elections on 2 May 2024, over 15,000 Equity members signed petitions calling for arts funding to be protected and thousands more wrote to their local councillors or raised the issue at a local question time.
We need to redouble our efforts ahead of the general election and make sure that all politicians know that voters value the arts. Every Equity member can play a role, together we can put arts funding firmly on the national agenda in the run up to the election.
Commenting, Equity General Secretary Paul W Fleming said, “This election is long overdue. Equity will be undertaking unprecedented non-partisan campaigns through the coming weeks to demand the long overdue end to austerity, freedom for trades unions, and rights for workers from every candidate. We demand a government committed to good work for all artists, good art for all workers, and Equity for all people.”
Look out for more details of the next campaign steps, as well as our full set of priorities and demands, in the coming weeks. View our campaign page here.
