Our Letter to the Culture Minister: Recommendations on the Culture Strategy
Culture Counts wrote to Neil Gray MSP Minister for Culture, Europe and International Development on 20 April 2022.
We wrote in response to National Partnership for Culture’s recommendations on the Culture Strategy. Culture Counts members broadly welcome the NPC’s recommendations under the headings; Culture and Wellbeing, Culture and Education, Measuring Change. We’ve also highlighted a gap between the recommendations and a set of actions, in particular relating fair work.
Read our letter in full below. To reduce energy consumption, please only download the PDF if you have to.
Dear Minister,
Response to National Partnership for Culture’s recommendations on the Culture Strategy
I’m writing following the National Partnership for Culture’s recent recommendations on the Culture Strategy. Culture Counts members broadly welcome the NPC’s recommendations under the headings:
Culture and Wellbeing
Culture and Education
Measuring Change
There is now no disputing the cross-cutting benefits culture can provide across Scottish Government portfolio policy areas. Such as the ability to improve outcomes in Education, Health and Social Care, Community Wellbeing and Justice. The NPC’s recommendations recognise this and point the way to fully realising the benefits of culture in these contexts.
Nonetheless, there remains a significant distance between the recommendations and a set of actions that will see these benefits realised. Without clear aims and actions, results could fall short of ambition.
In the lead up to the 2021 Scottish Parliament election, Culture Counts produced a Crowd Sourced Manifesto, a central component of which was the development of a Culture Act. The proposed Culture Act, aligns with the NPC recommendations under the above headings and provides an outline of defined statutory measures that would enable the achievement of ambitions.
For example: Committing and resourcing Local Authorities, Health and Social Care Partnerships, Schools, and Educational Institutions to produce and deliver cultural plans; establishing cross-portfolio funding mechanisms; improving data and evidence systems; improving equity of access to culture and providing the required support to Culture Sector workforce.
Culture and Fair Work
There is no disputing the importance of fair work principles. These are significant, potentially transformative aspirations for our sector and our nation. This said, we have serious reservations on the NPC’s recommendations under the Culture and Fair Work heading.
The recommendations do not take account of the funding context of the sector. Delivering fair work in any setting will require additional investment, money that the Culture Sector currently does not have to give.
Currently we are seeing a worrying decline in real-terms funding for the arts. The 2022/23 Creative Scotland and Other Arts budget shows an 11.8% cut in comparison to 2018/19. The National Performing Companies are experiencing a 10.2% cut over the same period. This follows a longer-term trend of flat funding – the sector has not received a real-terms or inflationary increase for a number of years. This immediate sharp drop in funding follows a decade of effective cuts due to inflation.
It is vital that the Spending Review delivers on the SNP manifesto commitment to provide three-year funding settlements, which include inflation. This is vital for recovery and renewal for a sector devastated by the Covid-19 public health emergency. Three-year settlements will allow cultural organisations to enter into partnership agreements with other funding agencies, bringing more funding into the sector and to begin to deliver improvements on Fair Work.
The national decline in funding is taking place at the same time as Local Authorities slash culture budgets across Scotland. A 2020 report from Audit Scotland shows that real terms spend on culture and related services has reduced 13.8% since 2013/14, while demand for services has increased. The Audit Scotland Accounts Commission has repeatedly reported on the importance multi-year financial settlements to enable long-term financial planning.
Culture Counts fully support the NPC recommendation of minimum levels of culture planning by Local Authorities, Health and Social Care Partnerships, Schools and Educational Establishments as doing more with less is not possible and it has an impact on fair work and on the diversity of the sector. If we want to unlock the huge benefit that Culture can bring to outcomes in Health and Social Care, Education, Community Building and Justice, cross-portfolio investment is essential.
As regards an action to reverse the long-term cuts to Local Authorities’ culture budgets. Culture Counts will soon bring forward a proposal for implementation to the SNP’s “Percent for Culture” manifesto commitment, which would create an endowment for Local Authority culture spending, to be allocated according to GAE calculations. This would go some of the way to reversing long term cuts and could be implemented by way of a Culture Act.
We look forward to meeting you in early June to discuss the Spending Review and in addition, we hope to ask for your support as to the continuing issue of Community Access to Community Spaces.
I hope that the information provided in this letter is useful and look forward to working together to achieve these shared aims.
Yours sincerely,
Jennifer Hunter
Director Culture Counts