ACNI absorbs initial cuts to spare the sector

The Arts Council of Northern Ireland (ACNI) will be bearing the full brunt of the immediate 2.1% in-year cuts being handed down by the Department of Culture Arts and Leisure, in an effort to lessen the damaging impact to arts organisations and audiences. Last month ACNI asked its exchequer funded clients to prepare impact statements for the unprecedented cuts, but the Board has decided “with some degree of pain” to mitigate the damage to the sector and will first of all be making cuts to its own budgets by not filling vacancies and redeploying earned income. Savings of £258k from ACNI's baseline exchequer funding of £12.3m have been found to avoid passing on cuts to the arts sector at this point, but further cuts of 2.3% will still have to be made following next month’s ‘monitoring’ round, and these will be passed on to more than 30 arts organisations. The 2.3% amounts to £283k – a cut that is likely to lead to a contraction of services as arts organisations are forced to concentrate on core activities. Job losses and reductions to staff salaries are also likely, and the situation could worsen given the “strong likelihood” that even more stringent cuts will be handed down from government in 2015/16.

ACNI will continue its battle to defend the sector. ACNI Chairman Bob Collins, said: “…the Council is determined and will continue to advocate for public investment in the arts. We will make the case again to the Northern Ireland Executive on how the arts are not only central to people’s lives, beneficial to their health and wellbeing but are already delivering the Executive’s own priorities on access, on participation and on limiting social exclusion and embracing equality.” Roisin McDonough, Chief Executive of the Arts Council said: “The Arts Council is already a lean organisation. If the government wants us to continue to develop the arts and fund organisations that make the arts more accessible to all, help tackle social exclusion, make a positive contribution to the cultural economy, then we must have the appropriate resources to do that.” She continued: “…these in-year cuts will negatively affect arts jobs but will mainly impact on the valuable education and outreach programmes that government has asked arts organisations to prioritise. The very programmes that target those who wouldn’t otherwise be able to access the arts, which help children, vulnerable young people and older people, these are the programmes which will be worst hit. This is a regrettable step.”

This will not be the first time that ACNI has gone on the offensive to defend its budgets. A 2007 campaign to increase arts funding and compensate for the estimated £4.6m loss of Lottery money that was to be diverted to the Olympics succeeded in securing a £7.6m funding uplift over three years. This followed a well-orchestrated protest involving ACNI in collaboration with Northern Ireland’s arts organisations, demanding a per capita funding figure that matched the other UK nations.