Executive Decision

No, it’s not an article about the movie with Halle Berry and Steven Seagal. It’s an interview with Lewis Robinson, a member of the Southwark Council executive with responsibility for the arts.

What’s involved in your role as Executive Member for culture, leisure and sports?
To be honest, the reason I took over this particular portfolio, which is often described as the ‘Minister for Fun’ (that’s culture, leisure and sport) was because there are jobs in local politics which involve sitting in the Town Hall looking over books, but this job involves going out and meeting people.

Literally every part of my portfolio is a front-facing service – swimming pools, libraries, local galleries, local arts providers, cultural groups. It’s about meeting people who are passionate and care about what they do – be it arts or sports.

The council is delivering services that people care about locally – be it improved services at Dulwich Library or refurbishing Dulwich Leisure Centre – and it’s my responsibility to make sure we deliver on all of those things on a day to day basis. One day I’ll be in Burgess Park with Mike Gatting because we’ve funded some  new cricket nets. The next day I’ll be meeting a gallery owner in Peckham, seeing her latest exhibition and looking at how we can help her.  It’s an out there job, rather than an in here job. And it’s fun.

Are we well-placed for culture and the arts in Southwark?

Southwark is one of the pre-eminent cultural boroughs in London. There’s a raft of world-class organisations along the south bank including Tate Modern and the Globe and then there’s our local gem, the Dulwich Picture Gallery. But there are also a lot of other organisations like the South London Gallery (pictured) and the Blue Elephant Theatre.


I’m very keen that Southwark keeps a strong cultural profile. A lot of councils see culture as an ‘add on’, but we recognise that the arts provide a lot of employment in the borough and give a lot of added value to the people who live here. And we mustn’t forget the visitors coming here as tourists.

It’s important that we have a cultural strategy, and that is just being refreshed at the moment. And it’s important that we have a Culture Department at the Town Hall – it’s the kind of thing some councils find easy to cut.  I want to make sure it’s there providing small grants for cultural organisations and supporting some of the growing cultural organisations in the borough as well.

Cllr Robinson and I met first at Kingswood House, on the Kingswood Estate. I asked him what he thought of the building.

It’s a hidden gem. ‘Hidden gems’ is something I’m particularly keen comes out in our cultural strategy.

You get off at West Dulwich station and there’s a sign saying ‘Welcome to West Dulwich. This way to Dulwich Picture Gallery.’  Lots of people come to Dulwich to see the Gallery, but there’s no signpost at Sydenham Hill station saying ‘Welcome. This way to Kingswood House.’ It’s not on the same scale, obviously, but people who come to Dulwich don’t realise sometimes what else there is to go and see in the area.

Part of my job is to make sure that some of these smaller and less-commercial pieces of history do receive some care and attention from the council. We try and promote them in a small way to the outside world.

Kingswood House is in the middle of one of the biggest estates in the borough. It’s much-loved by the community on that estate and there’s a library there which acts as a focus for the community. But step outside the estate and people aren’t aware it’s there. There is quite a lot more work we need to do with the Friends of Kingswood House and other organisations to build up a programme of events and other activities that could help promote the house.

It’s an example of something that’s not uncommon in local government, in that authorities often inherit these hidden gems that are not easy to maintain and are quite difficult to raise money for. They often let them run down. Over the last 20 years, the council has sometimes viewed Kingswood as more of a liability than a potential asset, and I take the view that it’s actually an asset and not a liability.

The House is booked out for weddings until the end of 2009, for example.  Once couples have seen the building they fall in love with it as a potential venue. That’s one way in which we can make sure we can preserve these small venues – it’s to look imaginatively at how we and they can raise money as I have to prove to the those in charge of finance at the council that I can balance the books at Kingswood and that it’s worth us supporting the place.

As an artist, sculptor, painter or writer what are the prospects of me living in a borough that welcomes creative activity?

I think there’s huge potential here. You’ve obviously got the major institutions along the river, but increasingly the council is supporting the development of a number of smaller cultural quarters.

There are small quarters in Camberwell – as part of the regeneration there and hidden away in Peckham –by the railway station. There’s some very interesting work happening there. 

There are a number of ways we can help small gallery owners and local artists – for example through the small grant programmes.
There’s the Cultural Grants programme which offers money to local organisations and there’s the Cleaner, Greener, Safer fund which is increasingly seeing applications for works of public sculpture. For example there’s a new installation on Denmark Hill which was funded by that programme (pictured).

The Council is very supportive of some of the smaller organisations and there are programmes that are geared towards smaller groups and artists to approach us for funding.

I ask Cllr Robinson about the public baths in the borough.

Unlike many other London boroughs who have managed to close their Victorian baths over the years, we’re going to refurbish ours.  There’s a fundamental difference between an original Victorian bath and a 1970s leisure centre, and that is that the Victorian baths have stood the test of time over the years – they are actually in better nick that the ones built in the 70s. I take the view that there’s no point in digging another hole and putting water in it when you’ve got a perfectly good pool that’s been there and is still working.

Now the baths at Camberwell and East Dulwich have both suffered from a lack of investment in the last fifty years. So they will have approximately £5million spent on each of them in the next few years. We’re on site now in Dulwich, which means the pool is going to be closed from 5 May until next year – it’s an unfortunate consequence, but it’s a big piece of work.

And we hope to be on site in Camberwell in September or October of this year. In terms of preserving our local heritage, these two buildings are important to the history of the local area, many people have a great affection for them and it’s great that we are able to maintain the facilities and the buildings.

There was a time when it was fashionable to make new buildings and install exciting flumes going round and round the building and wave machines. Well that’s fine, but in these times of austerity, we simply can’t afford a £25 million all singing, all dancing pool. What we can afford to do is to preserve these facilities and secure them for the next generation to use.

Images thanks to Peter Gasston on flickr with CCL.