I am both honoured to be here and very nervous. Ballet dancers do not usually speak, but the time has come to break silence, and argue for the survival and future of a great European art form in this country. I speak as a former dancer with the two Royal Ballet companies, now an independent ballet choreographer and teacher, and with Jennifer Jackson co-founder of the Ballet Independents' Group.

What is ballet? Why is it important? Why should it be funded and supported? It is a highly evolved dance form rooted in European culture. The principles which underpin its technique and movement vocabulary go back to classical Greek ideals of harmony, proportion, symmetry and balance. It has drawn on and distilled centuries of European folk and social dance in all its richness and variety. It belongs to no one artist, yet its very impersonality can reveal the most personal expression of the individual. It has been and can still be the collective expression of a culture through dance, a shared language. As we hurtle towards the digital age, ballet as a mode of artistic expression, with its logic and subtle efficiency, its basic movements combined in dazzling complex structures or laid bare in all their functional elegance, seems to me as contemporary and as relevant as at any time in its history.

It represents a formidable challenge to all those who engage with it, demands the highest of standards, rigour, concentration, analytical observation and understanding, alongside sensitivity and the ability to co-operate and work as a team. It is acknowledged by other western theatre dance forms as an indispensable element in any dancer's training, and the wider educational and social benefits of the transferable skills it inculcates have been proven through many outreach projects in schools and the community.

But above all it is an expressive art, and the arts fulfil an intrinsic human need. We are belittled, spiritually and intellectually the poorer for not valuing the arts. As arts practitioners and enthusiasts we come here today to remind politicians, bureaucrats, media and public of this.

This country has during this century made a major contribution to the development of ballet through a recognisable national style and rich creative tradition. The works of the Royal Ballet's great choreographers, Ashton and MacMillan are now staples of the international repertoire. Among the younger generation of classical choreographers, Bintley, Corder and Lustig have all established international reputations. Meanwhile Burrows, Hawkins and Maliphant have won respect in contemporary and independent dance circles, part of an exciting cross-fertilization of dance genres.

This is a living tradition of creativity to celebrate. A primary purpose of arts subsidy is to nurture this creative energy, to provide an environment in which it can flourish. Public subsidy is also there to make the arts accessible to all those who want to experience them. The relentless reduction of arts subsidy over the past 20 years now cuts so deep as to jeopardise these aims, stunting the ability to grow and evolve, alienating the arts from the public.

In ballet there is a loss of confidence and vision, an increased reliance on old repertoire and old formulae which isolates the form in a ghetto of nostalgia. The Royal Ballet struggles to maintain its position as a great international company on funding far below that of equivalent European companies such as the Paris Opera Ballet or Dutch National Ballet. And if the Royal Ballet struggles with its lion's share of the dance funding cake, then how much more so the wider contemporary and independent scene, home to so much vital innovation, reflection of the rich diversity of our multicultural society. A properly funded national company serves the whole dance community; setting standards in practice and production, generating a higher profile and wider public for dance, sharing its resources to fuel development. Funding inadequacies only fuel resentment, and create division and misunderstanding where there could be exchange and co-operation.

The redevelopment of the Royal Opera House gives the Royal Ballet the chance to transform itself into a powerhouse for the regeneration of the form, for the nurturing of new creative talents and the classics of the future, in tune with a new audience and new media, alert to the mind-blowing possibilities of new technologies.

In the redeveloped opera house, for the first time in 50 years the company will be properly resident in its home theatre. Much has been made of the Royal Ballet's present nomadic state, but in reality it has been nomadic for years, shuttling up and down the Piccadilly line between the Royal Ballet School in West London and Covent Garden. I want to highlight two specific benefits of relocation. One is the new studio theatre space, something the company has never had, an on-site facility for the development of new talent and new work. For example we have only to look across the river to the National Theatre and the use made of their studio space and intimate Cottesloe Theatre in the development of new productions; Patrick Marber's play Closer now opening in the West End and Ian Holm as King Lear this weekend on BBC television, to cite only a couple of recent award winning successes.

The relocation of the Royal Ballet and its senior school to Covent Garden also gives the company the chance to develop a modern identity, as a local presence, integral to the cultural life of that part of London. As a truly resident company it can forge links with the local community, escape the ivory tower, build a new relationship with a real audience who will take a real interest in watching the emergence of future artists.

For this to happen the Royal Ballet needs vision and commitment, but also realistic funding, and political and media support. It will not be achieved by cramming three companies into one venue, privatising the Royal Opera House and its companies or disposing of the Coliseum. Penny pinching today would diminish the quality of future `life in this country in a way that no tax cut or cash benefit could ever make up for. Ballet Independents' Group urges Sir Richard Eyre and his working party to consider this when they make their recommendations.