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Dateline: 19th March, 2005
"Hard Choices in a Tough Climate" - ACE Three Year Funding Strategy Arts Council England has announced its budget strategy up to March 2008 and its funding for over 1,100 arts organisations during this three-year period. The Arts Council's grant-in-aid remains at £412m between 2005/06 and 2007/08. In the context of that standstill settlement, the Arts Council has developed a tough financial strategy to support four key priorities. The priorities are:
In order to deliver those priorities the Arts Council is cutting back its budgets to develop new opportunities for the arts and its budget for the Creative Partnerships programme for young people, and reducing the number of organisations receiving regular funding. The Arts Council has also frozen its administration budget over the three years. This rigorous financial strategy has meant that the Arts Council is able to increase its budget for regular funding to organisations from £300,797,000 in 2005/06 to £325,802,000 in 2007/08. This strategy allows it to give sixty per cent of all regularly funded arts organisations (645 organisations) a standard annual increase of 2.75 per cent in 2006/07 and 2007/08. In addition, twenty per cent (232 organisations) will receive an annual increase of above 2.75 per cent, including significant increases for arts organisations with major capital developments to ensure that they have the revenue to fulfil their potential. Thirty-four new organisations will be given regular funding for the first time. By 2007/08, fourteen per cent of regularly funded organisations will be led by Black and minority ethnic artists or key to the infrastructure that supports their work. Allocations for a small number of organisations remain under review and will be announced over the coming months. The budgets to organisations for 2005/06, which have already been announced, are confirmed. The Council has chosen to fund fewer organisations better: as a result, by March 2008, a total of 121 organisations will have ceased to receive regular funding. Fifty four organisations will receive annual increases of below 2.75 per cent or no increase at all. The Arts Council's budgets to develop new opportunities in the arts and new partnerships will reduce by £13 million and the guaranteed financial allocation to support work with children and young people through the Creative Partnerships programme will drop from the budgeted £45 million a year to £32 million in 2005/06, rising to £35 million in 2007/08. Arts Council Chair, Sir Christopher Frayling said, "As a result of the standstill settlement for the arts from the 2004 Spending Review, the Arts Council has made some hard choices in a tough financial climate. "We have acted responsibly to ensure a degree of budgetary stability for arts organisations. However, that stability is fragile and cannot be sustained beyond 2008. It is built on one-off flexibility and a reduction in other areas of our budget. "While we are pleased to have been able to deliver increases in funding to the majority of our arts organisations, there are many things we have not been able to do. Many truly excellent artists and organisations will receive a standard increase rather than the investment needed to match their ambition and support growth. "The arts contribute an enormous amount to the life of this country and to the economy. If there is not a better settlement in the 2006 Spending Review it will mean real cuts to more arts organisations. We must work together with our partners in the arts and in government to make the case for the arts as strongly and effectively as we can. We must begin that work now." Details of funding in individual ares can be downloaded from the ACE website as Microsoft Word documents, as follows:
Please note that all three Archive indices are very long and will therefore take some time to download.
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