asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what was the total of Government grants and other financial assistance to the arts in each of the past five years for which figures are available.

Government grants are as follows:

	£ million
1970–71	25·5
1971–72	31·5
1972–73	37·7
1973–74	42·5
1974–75	52·9

This covers expenditure on the national collections in Great Britain and on the Arts Council and other arts as specified in the Appropriation Accounts. It excludes expenditure on libraries and on the maintainance of historic buildings and ancient monuments in Government ownership and on grants towards privately owned houses. Local authorities are the other major source of financial assistance to the arts, local museums and galleries. As I informed the hon. Member for Reading, North (Mr. Durant) on 30th January last—[Vol. 904, c. 394.]—this information is not available over the period 1970–75 for the arts as a whole but a special survey mounted in England by the Arts Council in 1972–73 showed that this expenditure totalled between £14·7 million and £15·5 million. Information is available, however, for expenditure by the local authorities in Great Britain on local museums and galleries in each of these five years. The information is as follows:

	£ million
1970–71	6·8
1971–72	9·0
1972–73	10·2
1973–74	13·7
1974–75	20·9