All around Wales there are care homes, hospital wards and communities where people live without creativity, inspiration or hope for the future. Reported levels of loneliness and mental health are spiralling. I was the former chair of Live Music Now in Wales, a role now undertaken by the former Presiding Officer, Rosemary Butler. This is a charity that sends and funds high-quality musicians to play to people who don’t usually have access to live music. The organisation focuses in particular on working in care and nursing homes and in special schools, and I can testify to the fact that the experience of being exposed to the arts for residents is truly transformational.

The Welsh Assembly’s new cross-party arts and health working group, in collaboration, where appropriate, with the Arts Council of Wales, is in a unique position to bring these two worlds of the arts and health together. The group has written to both the health Secretary and the culture Secretary to ask for help in funding a study to prepare an evidence-based report where efforts would be made to collate the information and great work that’s already being undertaken in Wales to help justify a shift of funding from health to the arts and, where necessary, to do more pointed research in order to harden the evidence needed.

In care homes, the value of creative interaction is underrated, in particular in fields like dementia. Participation in the arts and music by older people can significantly improve their quality of life and mental health, and we believe that providing exposure to the arts is more cost-effective than popping pills. We hope that a dedicated piece of work commissioned on the subject will justify our position and help to make the case for shifting a proportion of that funding from health to the arts with a view to improving health and well-being outcomes for the people of Wales.