The latest funding round by Creative Scotland has a baff ling element, writes

member states – but is free to apply its own laws for any other commerce.

Europhiles of all political persuasions talk as if removing the UK from the EU’s undemocratic and costly tentacles would bring economic isolation when the reverse is the case. While some three million British jobs may be connected to our trade with the European Union, there are also some five million EU jobs connected to its trade with the UK. The UK is the EU’s biggest and best customer and the prospect of trade barriers is consequently zero.

The suggestion is made that we would not be able to trade with the EU and that we would lose access to the single market and yet all we would be doing is replicating the position of the US, Australia, India and China who enjoy the trading gains without the membership pains.

The economic and political prospects for the EU are frightening and yet rarely discussed in Scotland. The EU is heading for a demographic time-bomb with a severely ageing population that has high expectations of pensions and healthcare – relying on a tax base that is contracting as the number of EU working-age employees shrinks. Unlike Germany, the UK will see its workforce grow – meaning that the EU will become ever more dependent on financial transfers from our shores.

How odd that the SNP objects to Scottish tax revenues going south to Westminster but is sanguine about bailing out the European Union. Might Scots begin to see this all differently?

IT IS hard to believe more than two years have passed since Scotland’s cultural sector was thrown into total disarray. The infamous artists’ rebellion – laid out in a damning open letter – proved to be the nail in the coffin of Creative Scotland’s chief executive Andrew Dixon after months of criticism.

It has taken some 25 months for the quango to recover from an excruciating crisis which unfolded within just two years of the Scottish Government launching its new funding body.

The launch of Creative Scotland in the summer of 2010 came after a long, protracted process and an agonising debate over how the arts sector should be run in Scotland.

No-one can accuse Creative Scotland’s board or Mr Dixon’s successor, Janet Archer, of rushing into any decisions to repair the damage caused by the rift.

The organisation has taken its time to try to get things right over the past two years, a process that culminated in last week’s announcement on exactly who will benefit from its long-term backing.

The number of organisations receiving three-year grants has been more than doubled, no small achievement considering that Creative Scotland’s own overall budget has largely remained the same in recent years. And very few organisations have had a funding cut, despite Creative Scotland receiving £212 million worth of applications for a £90m three-year funding pot, which its board recently increased by £10m.

There has been some clever managing of expectations by the quango. Frankly, no-one in the culture sector had any idea what settlement they were going to end up with.

Some organisations have received significant increases, 20 applicants have been put on long-term support for the first time, and Creative Scotland has clearly learned from previous arts funding debacles by limiting complete cuts to a relative handful of organisations.

But the significant cuts for two of Scotland’s best-known theatres – the Royal Lyceum and Traverse in Edinburgh – are baffling to say the least.

Creative Scotland is right to point out the significant funding that these two theatres will still receive – £5.6 million between them in the next three years – but cuts of 17.5 and 11 per cent are still significant.

Both of these companies are understandably dismayed and angered at their treatment. Ahead of its 50th anniversary next year, the Lyceum has gone as far to say it has been punished for its success.

The bitter irony of the treatment of the Traverse and Lyceum is that around half of the 100 artists to put their names to that open letter two years ago have links to these venues. Maybe it is not the end of the saga after all.