MINISTER GETS IT IN THE MNEK OVER ARTS
RISHI ‘SO INSENSITIVE’ IN SUGGESTING RETRAINING
MNEK urged Rishi Sunak to put his heart before his head as he blasted the chancellor for seeming to suggest that artists should retrain for other jobs during the pandemic.
The singer – whose collab with Joel Corry Corry, Head & Heart, He was the song of the summer – told Guilty Pleasures why art should take priority over sport. ‘I have friends that are not guaranteed payment from anything that they are doing,’ said the 25-yearold. ‘They put all their eggs in one basket.
‘They don’t want to be told by a rich dude that is worth £200million that they should go get a normal job. It’s insensitive.’
Mr Sunak, whose father-in-law is a billionaire, has since denied suggesting that people in the struggling creative industries retrain and find other jobs after telling ITV last week: ‘I can’t pretend that everyone can do exactly the same job that they were doing at the beginning of this crisis.’
Asked if he was telling those from the arts and music world to find a new job in a different sector, he added: ‘That fresh and new opportunity for people – that’s exactly what we should be doing.’
MNEK fumed: ‘The issue lies in all the money that the government put into other things like f***ing sport! That could go into the arts because the arts is one of the main things that has kept everyone going through this pandemic. Whether it’s music or set design or music videos,
TV. It’s all art. Even the sofas these rich-arse people are sitting on are a result of art. It just doesn’t happen by chance.’
Back with new single More Than Words, featuring Sleepwalkrs, MNEK is grateful to see the offers coming in. He will be performing Head & Heart on Strictly Come Dancing’s launch episode later this month. ‘It’s a nice feeling to feel wanted,’ he said. ‘I am very thankful.’