Region: Arts Council England
On 24 May 2010 the Department for Culture, Media and Sport announced a £19 million reduction in our 2010/11 income from government. This cut is in addition to an earlier in-year reduction of £4 million announced in the April 2009 Budget, meaning that our 2010/11 budget has been reduced by a total of £23 million.
We’ve been working hard to find ways to implement this cut while protecting art, and the organisations that enable it to happen, to the fullest extent possible. The cut to regularly funded organisations’ 2010/11 income from Arts Council will, therefore, be limited to 0.5 per cent.
This relatively minimal reduction has been made possible only by the exceptional use of £9 million of the Arts Council’s historic reserves, access to which was previously blocked by government. Had this not been the case, we would have been forced to pass on a three per cent (£10.8 million) cut to our funded organisations.
In addition, we have identified cuts to other areas, these include:
- £1.8 million from the revenue grants of the two highest funded organisations not directly producing art (£1.6 million from Creativity Culture and Education and £0.2 million from Arts & Business*, a four per cent reduction)
- £0.4 million from further cuts to our operating costs (bringing savings on operating costs to a total of £6.9 million this year)
- £6 million from savings due to the postponement of a major public engagement project, cuts to our audience development plans, and to funds for partnership working with local authorities and the private sector
Our Chair, Dame Liz Forgan, said: ‘In-year cuts are always the most difficult to manage, because plans have already been made against an expected level of income. But we have done our best to minimise the effect on our funded organisations and the art they produce so brilliantly.
‘Some immediate impact was inevitable, and in the longer term the arts sector will also feel the effect of the cutting back of projects that are key to its long-term sustainability and development. But I am confident that the decisions we have taken are the right ones – for art, for artists and for the audiences we serve.’
Arts Council England’s budget for the next three years (2011-14) will be decided in the government’s spending review, the results of which are expected in the autumn.
* These figures are rounded up to the first decimal point. The exact reduction for Arts & Business is £160,000.
*reprinted from Arts Council England website