Of course. Thank you, convener. Good morning, everyone, and thank you for inviting us to give evidence this morning.
We are here to talk about sustainable funding for arts and creative organisations in Scotland. Creative Scotland’s most significant means by which we provide that is three-year regular funding. Our first round spanned 2015 to 2018 and our guidance for the second round—2018 to 2021—was published in November 2016. The process and guidance for regular funding was tested with sector representatives who worked with us to review the guidance prior to us going live.
I want to start by saying that I am profoundly sorry that the delivery of the process has been a negative one for many. We cannot let that happen again. My role as chief executive of Creative Scotland is to take ultimate responsibility for everything that Creative Scotland does. I am currently in dialogue with everyone who is involved, at every level in the process, and I will make sure that we learn from this moment and resolve all the outstanding issues fairly and openly.
I would like to offer some context, which I hope the committee will find helpful. Regular funding is an open application process. This time, we had 184 applications and we have funded 121 organisations. Overall, we have committed to spending £33.9 million on regular funding: £1 million a year more than previously. That was due to a £6.6 million uplift from the Scottish Government, for which we are very grateful. Regular funding is no longer reliant on the national lottery, as it previously was. Previously, we put £6 million of national lottery funding into regularly funded organisations.
Many of you will be aware that, between September and December last year, we were scenario planning for some very difficult budget predictions. In the end, the budget was better than we expected, but it is important to recognise that the 21 per cent uplift that we communicated is made up of £10 million for screen, which is set against hard economic targets, and £6.6 million to replace the lost lottery income for the arts, as I have already outlined. That means that, in effect, our regularly funded organisations budget remains at standstill.
Despite that, we have been able to support 121 excellent organisations across Scotland and across art forms for the next three years. At one point last autumn, we thought that we might be able to fund only about half of those. The 19 new organisations in the network have not had a lot of press, so I will tell you a little about them. They include the Alchemy film festival in Hawick; Bodysurf Scotland in Moray; Starcatchers, Scotland’s national arts and early years organisation; Lyra, which is based in Craigmillar in Edinburgh; Toonspeak Young People’s Theatre, which provides free, high-quality drama and theatre activities for young people aged 11 to 25 in Glasgow; Theatre Gu Leòr, the acclaimed Gaelic theatre company; and the Tinderbox collective, which is based at North Edinburgh Arts.
Making funding decisions is never easy, and nowhere more so than in Scotland, where creative talent and ambition far outweigh the funding that we have available, particularly in the context of increased reliance on Creative Scotland as alternative sources of support come under increasing pressure. I fully understand that even those who have received standstill funding are really struggling. However, as stated in our arts strategy, we are committed to working with all organisations to support them to build resilience in the future.
Overall, the applications that we received totalled 33 per cent more than our available budget. That created a real challenge for us, particularly when organisations asked for an average of a 23 per cent uplift. We have tried to help by supporting all the organisations that are coming out of regular funding through providing transition funding of between six and 12 months at the same level that they are currently funded at. We are also meeting organisations to explain our decisions and, where organisations have been unsuccessful, discuss alternative routes to funding and how we might be able to support them in the future.
Regular funding is one of our three routes to funding, sitting alongside open project and targeted funding, which includes screen. Over the coming three years, we expect to distribute about £83 million of Government and national lottery funds a year across the three funding routes. One immediate thing that I want to tackle, which is really important to me, is to make project funding more straightforward for artists and artist-led organisations.
I completely recognise and appreciate that the regular funding process has been more challenging this time round than it needed to be, both for those applying and for our staff.
It is clear that the introduction of the touring fund, which was based on a review of touring that included consultation, did not chime with everyone in the theatre sector and is not seen as a replacement for regular funding. That is one of the reasons why the board elected to take stock, increase the budget that is available for regular funding and add organisations into the network.
We understand that the final stage of the process has created real difficulties. None of us wants to relive the experience in three years’ time. That is why, as we have already announced, we are committed to a root-and-branch review of how we fund. We will, importantly, do that in full collaboration with the people and organisations that we support.
We welcome all the constructive communications that we have received, of which there have been a significant amount. Much dialogue has emerged. We are meeting sector representative bodies—such as the Scottish Contemporary Art Network, the Federation of Scottish Theatre, Literature Alliance Scotland and others with which we already work closely—in the coming weeks to shape how we approach the review.
I thank the dedicated, hard-working and knowledgeable staff at Creative Scotland, who work every day to make a positive difference to art and culture in our country. Many have recently joined us after high-profile careers in the sector. Others have built up immense knowledge over years of service. They have worked thoughtfully and diligently on the regular funding round, dedicating a great deal of time, energy and care to the process.
We are all committed to doing things differently in the future. Many ideas have surfaced as we have worked through our difficult decisions and we look forward to sharing them as we enter into dialogue over the coming months.