UK Government Budget 2025 response
Our Director, Trevor MacFarlane FRSA sets out some early thoughts following today’s announcements.
The Autumn Budget 2025 makes clear that the UK’s creative, cultural and heritage sectors are relying more and more on wider economic policy than on dedicated cultural investment. The most meaningful boosts this year won’t come through the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, but through decisions that shape the lives of the people who make, run and enjoy culture.
Low-income families will feel the biggest lift from ending the two-child cap, a change that directly improves children’s life chances and their ability to access cultural opportunities as they grow. And audiences across the country will gain from the freeze on regulated rail fares, which helps keep travel to venues, museums, gig spaces and heritage attractions within reach for more people.
Cultural workers in employed roles, particularly front-of-house, production support and entry-level positions, will benefit from the increase in the minimum wage, which strengthens the floor for fair work even if it doesn’t reach the many freelancers who continue to face deep insecurity.
Local venues and high-street cultural spaces stand to gain from a progressive business-rates reform, which offers stability to many smaller organisations operating on thin margins. But there is also a real risk that some larger cultural institutions will face higher bills as the burden shifts. For organisations already grappling with inflation, rising operating costs and falling local authority support, even small increases can tip already fragile finances.
We welcome the introduction of an Overnight Accommodation Levy - a policy long championed by Culture Commons, mayors and others - giving regional leaders autonomy over how visitors support the places they enjoy. This is an important win. But it is vital that the new revenue stream is directed into the theatres, museums, festivals, heritage sites and public realm that define local identity and drive footfall. Without that, the levy will miss the opportunity to strengthen the very assets that make our towns, cities and rural destinations thrive.
There are positive steps in this Budget - including a £5m investment in books for schools, continued support for film studio activity and the first moves towards a more modern licensing framework for live and night-time venues. Yet the structural threats remain severe. National DCMS budgets are still heading downwards, local government finances are still under extraordinary strain, and there is still no long-term plan for cultural infrastructure.
If we want children lifted out of poverty today to have rich cultural lives tomorrow, we need more than indirect support. We need a settlement that positions culture at the heart of national renewal. Budget 2025 lays some of groundwork for this and is beginning to build back better from a difficult economic inheritance, but the UK Government’s work of rebuilding Britain’s cultural ecosystem is yet to get started.
Trevor MacFarlane FRSA, Director and CEO of Culture Commons
