Hillier calls for funding to arts and culture bodies to be sped up
GOVERNMENT FUNDING must get to arts and culture bodies shut in the pandemic while “there are still organisations left to support”, MPs have said.
The Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) committee unveiled a £1.57bn fund to help the cultural, arts and heritage institutions survive the pandemic last summer.
Of the £1bn that has been made available, some £830m in grants and loans has been awarded to different organisations so far, but only £495m of that has been paid out, the National Audit Office report said.
The department assumed, in the worst-case scenario, that social distancing would remain until the end of March this year and that demand for the likes of theatre tickets and venue capacity would remain at 40 per cent of pre-Covid-19 levels.
But the current situation exceeds this worst-case scenario.
Meg Hillier MP, who is chairwoman of the Committee of Public Accounts, urged payments, which are awarded by arm’s-length bodies, to be sped up.
“The culture, arts and heritage sector has been one of the hardest-hit by the pandemic with many organisations now having been closed for nearly a year,” she said.
“Many across the sector will have welcomed the funding announced last summer.
“But eight months later, more than half of the £1bn made available so far is still waiting in the wings.
“With the sector’s shutdown already past Government’s worstcase scenario, DCMS needs to get support out to organisations while there are still organisations left to support.”
The National Audit Office report said that the DCMS aimed to support the survival of 75 per cent of the organisations in the sector at risk during 2020-21.
Museums, galleries, cinemas, music venues and theatres had to close their doors in March last year when the UK entered the first national lockdown.
Some reopened partially in the summer and autumn, but many have remained entirely or mostly closed for nearly a year.