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Local MP Peggy Nash is scratching her head as to why the federal government decided to cut several national art and cultural programs such as PromArt, which subsidizes international promotional tours of Canadian artists, and Trade Routes, another cultural subsidy initiative, last week.

Foreign Affairs officials reportedly confirmed last Friday that PromArt will lose its $4.7-million budget next spring, effectively putting an end to the program for budget reasons.

"It's a terrible decision by the federal government," Nash told The Villager Wednesday. "Promoting Canada internationally is part of what these programs are all about. The arts define who we are."

As a Member of Parliament for a riding rich in artists and workers in the cultural industries, Nash felt compelled to write Prime Minister Stephen Harper to voice her concerns.

"The reduced capacity of our artists to export and showcase their work abroad means less attention and investment back here in Canada," she wrote. "With the tourism industry in a slump over the high Canadian dollar, what cities like Toronto need is more exposure abroad, not less."

PromArt and Trade Routes, which provides financial support to entrepreneurs in the arts and cultural sectors such as crafts, design and film/video (among a long list of others), remain crucial to our country's art and cultural sector, Nash said. These programs have a high return on their investment. The cuts, she said come at an inopportune time, when the House of Commons is not sitting.

"The capacity for a proper public debate on these important decisions is very limited at the moment," she wrote.

The government denies there's a problem with the environment, it denies that it is under funding and undercutting the arts, Nash said. The Parkdale-High Park riding boasts many, many artists who understand the importance government money.

"They understand that funding the arts to reach out to the rest of the world is fundamentally important," she said.

Harper has yet to respond to her letter, in which Nash asks him to reconsider the program cuts.

"They are not in the best interests of Canada's cultural sector, the country's economic performance and the general well-being of communities like mine across the country," she wrote.

It is Nash's goal to help people learn about the cuts and hopefully, encourage the government to re-think its decision.

"So many artists live on a shoe-string budget," she said. "Cutting the arts does not make sense."

To read Nash's letter to the prime minister, visit www.peggynash.ca