Report sets out ‘blueprint for change’ to increase working-class representation in the arts

Inquiry finds class should become protected characteristic and calls for rise in number of apprenticeships

An inquiry into class representation in creative fields has recommended changes believed to be the first of their kind in Greater Manchester to increase the number of working-class people in the arts.

Class Ceiling, a report led by Nazir Afzal, the chancellor of the University of Manchester, and Avis Gilmore, the former deputy general secretary of the National Education Union, was announced on 26 September, with promises of providing a “blueprint for change” that would highlight solutions to the obstacles that have kept working-class representation in the arts low, with the hope that such changes could be put in place throughout the country.