The Stage

Culture sector hit by £4 million of cuts in Budget

Published Wednesday 22 April 2009 at 23:42 by Alistair Smith

Arts institutions are facing £4 million of cuts, under cost-cutting measures announced in today’s Budget.

Although the figure is significantly less than the £14 million that had been feared as a ‘worst case scenario’ by Arts Council England, it will still be felt across the cultural sector and significantly diminishes the extra funds which had been promised to ACE by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport in the third year - 2010/11 - of its last three-year funding settlement.

A spokesperson for ACE said: “It is a shame that the government has found it necessary to cut funding to culture but we will do our best to protect the interests of audiences who deserve the best art there is.

“That is why, in implementing these cuts, we will not reduce our planned investment in the arts organisations we fund on a regular basis - many of whom have already planned against expected income in 2010/11. Instead we will reconsider our existing and planned new projects and look to find savings there.

“This is a short term solution but not without its implications as these projects

are our investment in the development of the arts. The arts are far more than a luxury add-on - they are quality of life and, with sufficient public investment, they can be central to economic recovery.”

ACE had not expected to discover immediately how much funding it was going to lose as part of the Budget.

However, in a surprise move, the £4 million savings were detailed in the body of the Budget report.

The report says that is wants the DCMS to make “£20 million of savings through driving further efficiencies including across DCMS’s central and

NDPBs’ [non-departmental public bodies, such as ACE] back office and lower priority programmes. This includes £3 million from S4C and £4 million from the Arts Council England.”

The cuts will be in addition to the £6.5million per year savings to the arts council’s running costs, which were announced as part of the original settlement.

National Campaign for the Arts director Louise de Winter said the cuts would cause “more pain than gain”.

She said: “We understand why the Chancellor has had to make significant cuts to the public purse and while we are grateful that cuts to the arts budget were not as great as some had speculated, we would like to stress why it is important to retain levels of investment in parts of our economy.

“In times of recession, the one thing that businesses and governments must do is to invest in research and development and prepare the ground for when the greenshoots start to appear. Our arts and culture are the R&D for our creative industries, which is also the fastest growing sector of our economy. It would be a damaging move to starve the laboratory of comparatively few funds, causing more grief than gain in the long run. Now is the time to be bold and to invest in our arts and culture.”

She added: “The NCA firmly believes that our arts and cultural industries offer real solutions to our current predicament: whether it is providing opportunities for entrepreneurs to lay some new foundations for business and employment or providing a much needed release and outlet for people in times of stress. Our arts and culture help us to understand who we are and our place in the world; they are also an incredibly powerful magnet for visitors to the UK and our tourism industry.