Coronavirus: Peter Corry challenges MLAs on theatre reopening plans

One of Northern Ireland's leading performers has said he "can't get my head around" why there has not been a plan to allow venues and theatres to reopen safely.

Peter Corry was giving evidence about the effect of Covid-19 restrictions on the arts to a Stormont committee.

He also said many young people were "struggling mentally" as arts and performance classes had been cancelled.

Theatres and concert venues have not yet been given a date to reopen.

Assembly members (MLAs) on the Communities Committee were also told that £29m in emergency funding for arts, culture and heritage has all been allocated.

As well as performing, Mr Corry runs a production company and is the artistic director of Belfast Performing Arts School.

"Like many, in March our diaries completely disappeared," he told MLAs.

"Everything that we had lined up for the year has gone.

"We are down to about 20% of what we thought we would have brought in in 2020."

Mr Corry said he could not understand why there was not a plan to allow venues to open and performances to resume safely, even with limited capacity.

"I found it very confusing, like many people in my sector, how whenever restaurants and pubs opened, when they did open up and people were allowed to socially distance and sit beside total strangers, that wasn't applied to concerts and theatres," he told MLAs.

"I still can't get my head around that, especially when it was then shown that singing was no more dangerous than speaking at the same volume.

"We need the support to find imaginative ways to open up performance."

Ministers have previously insisted that the rules on what can and cannot open are the safest way to avoid the spread of Covid-19 and are evidence-based.

Mr Corry also said the effect of restrictions had been "hugely difficult" for teachers and pupils at Belfast Performing Arts School.

"Many teachers have been utterly confused about what they can do and what they can't," he said.

"As a result, classes are cancelled no matter the size of the class or safety or suitability.

"That's to the detriment, not just to the livelihoods of the teachers, but also to the mental wellbeing of the students.

"I've spoken to many young people and many pupils in my school and they are struggling mentally with the uncertainty and the lack of routine, the inability to do what they enjoy most.

"For many young people, performing is the one place they feel they belong."

Mr Corry said online lessons worked "to a certain extent" but could not replace physical classes.

"I'm concerned that we are at a point where pupils are starting to disengage due to the lack of physical classes.

"Parents are also concerned about the amount of time their children are spending in front of a screen."

About £29m of emergency funding for the arts, culture, heritage and languages was agreed by the Stormont executive in September.

Officials from the Department for Communities (DfC) told MLAs on the committee that all of that funding had now been allocated to a number of schemes but not all had yet been spent.

"It is important to say that all of the funding has been allocated to distribution bodies," Joanna Gray from DfC told the committee.

"So there isn't any funding that is still sitting around waiting to have approvals or policy decisions made about it.

"It's just a case now of those delivery bodies making assessments of applications."