I am pleased to speak on behalf of the UK Presidency at the close of what has been a fascinating and thought provoking conference. May I begin by thanking the Prime Minister, Ferenc Gyurcsany, and András Bozóki, for hosting us all so admirably in their capital city. Thanks too to Raj Isar, and the European Forum for the Arts and Heritage, for the equally important role they have played in co-organising his conference.

Recently, in the UK, we have been lucky enough to host a festival of Hungarian events, called Magyar Magic. This kind of exposure to each others’ cultures in the EU is central to our multicultural vision for Europe. I am pleased to praise the work of both the British Council and, especially, the work of the Hungarian Cultural Centre in London. I know there are plans for many exciting events in the future.

It is a privilege for me to be standing before you today. My constituency, Tottenham, in the UK, has one of the best football teams in Europe, and is probably the most diverse of any within the EU. My constituents, between them, speak more than 180 different languages and, by and conventional standards, are among the most economically deprived of any in the UK. I am also proud to say that I represent a big – and wonderfully vibrant – eastern European community. In its diversity my constituency is, in fact, a microcosm of the Europe we find ourselves in today. And that is a Europe that is not at ease with itself.

We have all watched in shock over the last few weeks at the sight of burning cars and strife across Europe. Just as we all reeled in horror at the realisation that we in the UK had bred our own suicide bombers: young men who single-handedly turned many of our assumptions about multiculturalism on their head.

I believe that both these crises have their roots in a creeping alienation felt by a whole generation of our young, especially among our ethnic and urban poor. But I also believe that the crisis of national identity that is entwined with all this can only be unravelled by fashioning a new, inclusive story of who we are. A new story that can be heard and understood by everyone, however unpromising the hand they have been dealt.

An important new Convention was adopted in Paris last month, the UNESCO Cultural Diversity Convention, which was voted for almost unanimously. Let’s be clear. Our cultural diversity in Europe makes us strong. We must ensure that all our cultures continue to thrive, and by this I mean all the cultures that exist in Europe, not just European cultures. One lesson of the last six months must be that we should not try to pull up the drawbridge and create a fortress Europe, or try to ignore the rest of the world. In fact, the best way to understand the rest of the world is through these very cultures. And there has never been a more critical need for that understanding.

The Cultural Diversity Convention should ensure that cultural expressions all over the world are given the protection and promotion that is their right. Freedom of expression is the key factor here. And we in Europe can be proud of the freedoms enshrined in our democracies. Europe is not a monolithic culture, but a tapestry woven from many varied strands. UNESCO has done its work, and we in Europe must make sure that we continue to operate in that spirit.

And let us applaud the Audio-Visual and Culture Council held earlier this week in Brussels. We were able, for example, to reach the first stage of agreement on a new generation of funding programmes for the European audio-visual industries and for European cultural organisations.

Since 2004, and during the UK Presidency, we have worked closely with our Dutch, Luxembourger, Austrian and Finnish colleagues to pull together a work plan of continuity across these five presidencies. Our combined progress to date speaks for itself, and all five countries can be proud of these achievements. But there is still a lot that can be achieved, and I know you will be hearing from my colleague Franz Morak in a few moments.

For my parents’ generation, mass communication was a handful of radio stations, two television channels, and printed material produced by casting type from molten metal in wooden racks. In my lifetime this has mushroomed into a swirling maelstrom of media platforms. I quite literally cannot imagine the communications landscape that my children will cross. But on one thing I am sure. New technology must make Europe’s cultural collections – and shared values – more, not less, accessible to the public. That is our challenge, and that must be a big part of our collective response to burning cars and bombs on buses.

There has been much said, both positive and negative, about the role of immigration in our societies. Let us remember that our great cities across Europe – whether built on the river Seine, the river Thames, the river Danube – were all historically built on migration. Through skills, labour and trade, migrants have contributed billions of pounds and Euro to our economies.

It is also true that the vast majority of our black and minority ethnic heritage citizens are now born in the European Union. And in an EU population of over 459 million citizens, across 25 member states, I am proud to stand before you today as one of the handful of minority ethnic elected government ministers born, bred and working in the EU.

All of us in this room today who believe in the arts and culture, must too believe in the virtues of plurality. We know that it is when people of different nationalities, cultures and ages interact, that the greatest art is born. What would Picasso have been without the influence of Africa? Shelley without Italy? Gauguin without Tahiti?

In the weekend before the atrocity of the bombings in London on 7 July, people across Europe had joined together under the common banner of campaign against poverty on the African continent. The common language was not English, it was not French, or German. It was music. And it is music, it is the arts, it is culture, which can be the greatest force for social cohesion available to us today.