Playing safe should keep controversy at bay

WITH Creative Scotland having to turn down more than half the applications it received for regular funding for the next few years, there is no way everyone in the arts sector is going to be happy today. And without knowing who exactly has applied for funding and been rejected, it is also very difficult to get a full picture.

It is hard to imagine chief executive Janet Archer will be waking up to a major revolt today after cutting what appears to be a good deal for those bodies that have relied on her organisation’s backing. But even with allocating an extra £10 million from its budget for the next three years, Creative Scotland is still nowhere near meeting the demand for its resources in future.

With 264 applications being made for a total of £212m, things were simply never going to add up.

Whether it is realistic to expect the Scottish Government to plough tens of millions of additional support into its main funding body in the face of budget cuts elsewhere is an argument for another day.

In the meantime, the early verdict is that Creative Scotland has appeared to play things safe – and largely avoided stumbling into the kind of controversy that its predecessor regime ended up embroiled in.

A host of organisations on long-term funding deals have received enhanced backing, others have been put on a much more stable footing and 20 have received regular backing for the first time.

With organisations across the country on tenterhooks before the announcement, I suspect many in the sector will be breathing more easily today.