Regional Arts Board

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The Regional Arts Boards were arts organisations in the regions of England.

Regional Arts Boards were formed in 1990. Richard Wilding a senior civil servant was asked by his former Minister to review the structure of regional arts support in England. Wilding’s report was twelve English Regional Arts Associations with 10 Regional Arts Boards.

This changed the nature and structure of regional arts These would be independent limited companies with some Local Authority representation on their management boards. But the democratic role and the link between subscription and governance was broken. Payment of a subscription did not guarantee you a seat or a vote.

The ten new Regional Arts Boards lasted until 2002, when following an unexpected announcement in 2001, Arts Council England (as it had become) absorbed them into a single new body, thus reverting to the policy of regional offices it had abandoned in the 1950s. The ten regions, which reputedly had been based on Second World War Bomber Command regions, were also reduced to nine, bringing them into line with Regional Development Agency areas.