INHERITANCE. Something other than a legacy, which seems to infer the end of something, rather than a beginning?

There has been much talk of 2008 leaving a lasting legacy which, to me, has always begged the question: leave to whom? Once left, a legacy has to be administered, the anxiety that anyone drafting a will has to contemplate. It is also an anxiety that underlies any discussion of government or council funding: what will happen after the grant is given and used up?

Using the term legacy, then, also seems to suggest job done. We have done our bit, now it is over to you. All well and good if the beneficiaries have been identified and their competence and prudence proved. A completely different matter if the potential heirs are nothing more than complete bohemian party animals? And immediately a potential anxiety surfaces when thinking of the creative and arts communities for, actually, that is what they should be!

Perhaps then we should stop using the term legacy, which signifies the end of something, and adopt the more forward looking term, inheritance.

What can we take from what we are given? For us, this is already the programme in place and the renewed built environment. Perhaps we could take a lead from the Grosvenor project where the Duke, nice though he is, has not put £1bn on the table to fund the Grosvenor project simply to put a smile on all our faces for 2008. I suspect he suspects there is a turn to be made on his own inheritance?

Musing on this theme around council budget time does, of course, stem from some of the discussions revolving around the future of the cultural programme. It is pointless going over the whys and wherefores, except to say that the anxieties over future funding are real, which is why the Culture Company is already looking at ways to become totally independent from the inevitable and inescapable pressures of local government finance.

The current thinking is to evolve into some form of strategic body that can look at the cultural offering across both city and region to support, coax and perhaps cajole a more co-ordinated approach to programming and funding, something I think was missing, but is getting better, from the original planning. For instance, we now have our own Arena, should we not start looking next for our own Lowry? And where should it be? Can we finally finish the job of breathing life into St George’s Hall? Culture is region wide, not city-centre-centric. It needs to be at the centre of economic strategy not a bolt-on afterthought or local political football.

So, across 2008, perhaps we should not just think about getting through, walking away and leaving a legacy, but continue, like the Duke, building on inheritance?