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Chamber and committees

Question reference: S5W-11331

  • Asked by: Michelle Ballantyne, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
  • Date lodged: 18 September 2017
  • Current status: Answered by Fiona Hyslop on 27 September 2017

Question

To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to encourage film and television production (a) in the south of Scotland and (b) nationally, in light of recent figures that reportedly show a record year of investment in the Scottish film industry.


Answer

The Scottish Government allocates funding to Creative Scotland’s Production Growth Fund which incentivises productions to base themselves in Scotland and requires them to spend at least six times any grant received here, encouraging them to use Scottish facilities and crew. Recent projects to receive awards, shot in part in the south of Scotland, include Keepers, Churchill and Calibre. Creative Scotland's Screen Commission actively promote all areas of Scotland as filming locations.

In the Programme for Government we made a commitment to double investment for film and TV to £20m next year, to continue support for Gaelic TV production through MG Alba, and to create a dedicated Screen Unit to encourage further growth in the film and TV sector. We have also given financial support to the National Film and Television School’s plans to establish a base in Scotland.

We have also consistently argued for the BBC and other broadcasters to increase their support for the creative industries, most recently in our responses to consultations on the BBC and Channel 4 where we urged that these broadcasters are set higher quotas for the amount of network TV programming they make in Scotland.