Advocacy Update and Budget Timescales

A short update on recent advocacy work , as well as some further information on timescales for budget decisions from Westminster, Holyrood and Creative Scotland:

Letter to Culture Minister

Members of the Culture Counts Steering Group met with Minister for Culture, Europe and International Development Neil Gray on 26 October. Topics discussed included: The cost crisis, Transient Visitor Levy, % for Culture, Sector Data, Cross-Policy working and support for organisations previously part of SenScot’s Cultural Sen.

Culture Counts followed up this meeting with a letter to the Minister today, which outlines the outcomes and actions from the meeting, as well as providing the Minister and his team with further context on the Cost Crisis facing the sector.

You can read the letter here

Constitution, Europe, External Affairs and Culture Committee Report

On 31 October, the Scottish Parliament CEEAC Committee published their report: Pre-Budget Scrutiny 2023-24: Funding for Culture. The report outlines the sector’s current funding context, challenges ahead and possible solutions.

You can read the report in full here

You can read Culture Counts’ submission to the report here

Culture In Parliament

There was a lot of discussion of Culture in Holyrood this month, which we’ve compiled in our most recent Culture In Parliament blog.

You can read the blog here

NPF4

On 8 November, the Scottish Government published their most recent draft of National Planning Framework 4.  We were pleased to see Culture and Creativity threaded throughout the document.

You can read Culture Counts’ response to the draft here

You can read Culture Counts’ original submission to the NPF4 enquiry here

You can read full NPF4 Draft here

Budget Timescales:

Yesterday, on 17 November, the Chancellor of the Exchequer delivered his Autumn Statement. The statement can be read in full here.

Informed by the Autumn Statement, Deputy First Minister John Swinney will deliver the Scottish Government’s 23-24 budget on 15 December. At this time, funding levels for the Culture portfolio will be made clear.

As a result of current economic conditions, the Scottish Government recently completed an Emergency Budget Review for remainder of this financial year 22-23. This analysis from the Scottish Parliament Information Centre outlines the implications of this, and gives a sense of what we might expect for next year’s budget:

https://spice-spotlight.scot/2022/11/09/emergency-budget-review-2022-inflation-implications-laid-bare/

Economic uncertainty has caused Creative Scotland to postpone implementation of the new Multi-Year Funding Program for up to 12 Months. They are now working towards  the new funding programme being in place from April 2025

You can read Creative Scotland’s full announcement on the Future Funding Framework here