Indeed, even the simple application of Robinson's formulae to the situation of many companies in Wales would have given the National Assembly some guidance on absolute levels of funding. That work now remains to be done. It is theatre that will probably have the biggest cause for complaint, since the report demonstrates how difficult it is to achieve a consensus in the area of the ACW's most public failure. In effect, the committee passes the buck back to the ACW asking it to produce a strategy. And this in the land of song, and eisteddfodau for young and old, where more young people participate in some form of musical activity than any other art form and where it was cheaper to sit in the most expensive seat for a Welsh National Opera performance than for a six Nations rugby international.
Elitism is a word that bedevils any discussion of the arts, but in Wales even more so.
Yet it does not worry Welsh sports people in the same way. The Sports Council of Wales happily runs a support programme for the best talents under the title, Elite Cymru. Commentators at the Sydney Olympics lauded the British medal haul as the result of increased investment in 'the elite'. The review calls for national remit companies to embrace more enthusiastically their community and education roles. The quid pro quo should be a rather greater enthusiasm among our politicians for the best of the professional performing arts than is demonstrated in the report.