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SECRET

C.P.(49) 229

8TH NOVEMBER, 1949

CABINET

31

COPY NO.

FESTIVAL OF BRITAIN, 1951

Memorandum by the Lord President of the Council

When the Economic Policy Committee and later the Cabinet discussed the treatment of the Festival of Britain in relation to the economic cuts, it was generally agreed that we ought not to spoil the ship for a ha'p'orth of tar. I said (C.M.(49) 61st Conclusions, Minute 2(f)) that on this basis I was confident of being able to secure economies amounting to 2600,000, and hoped that it might be possible to reach the full saving of £1 million proposed by the Economic Policy Committee.

2.

Since the mecting I have with great difficulty secured savings of £700,000 in the gross cost of the Festival, and I have pressed strongly for the full £1 million. In order to

secure any greater saving some large item would have to be dropped from the Festival programme, and the selection of the item would constitutionally be a matter, not for the Government but for the all-Party Council of the Festival of Britain. I think my colleagues should know of the following difficulties which this course would involve.

thus

3.

On the most favourable assumption the saving could be achieved by dropping the land travelling exhibition, as was suggested to me by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The Festival Council, again on the most favourable assumption, might agree to this, but the effect would be that the cities of Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds and Nottingham would be wholly cut out of the Festival Exhibition programme, depriving fully half the population of England of any reasonable access to any major Festival event. This would almost certainly be regarded as a repudiation of the Government's assurance that the rest of the country as well as London would be given a real share in the Festival events, and the storm of criticism which would arise in the Midlands and the North would be very difficult to meet, and would severely prejudice the atmosphere of goodwill without which the Festival cannot succeed.

1.

That is the most favourable assumption. There is in addition a real risk that the Festival Council, or at any rate Soveral of its key members, would resign if they were pressed to agree to a course which they would feel inconsistent with the assurances of Government support on which they were willing to serve. We could not prevent these resignations, and if they occurred they might have such repercussions on the staff and on public opinion that the F150 of 109S

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