SUBMISSION FROM CREATIVE

Public Services Reform (Scotland) Bill

1. Thank you for inviting us to respond to the above consultation on the Public Services Reform (Scotland) Bill.

2. In December 2008 the set up a publicly owned Limited Company, 2009 Limited, under the chairmanship of Ewan Brown, to prepare for a new Non-Departmental Public Body, Creative Scotland, to be constituted when the approves the necessary legislation.

3. Creative Scotland 2009 Ltd is operationally independent but takes its direction from the Culture Minister and is accountable to the Minister. We have been given responsibility for all the practical transition arrangements, including staffing, systems and processes.

4. Our board comprises Ewan Brown, chair; two experienced business people (Chris Masters and Peter Cabrelli); two prominent practitioners (Sheena McDonald and Phil Cunningham) and Richard Holloway, who is chair of the joint board of and Scottish Screen.

5. We have one employee, Richard Smith, who is our Implementation Director; and he is working with the management and staff of the Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen to set up the new organisation and its new processes, structure and support functions.

6. At the end of March 2009, we agreed an implementation plan and timetable with the Minister. The timetable covers the four quarters to 31 March 2010 – and we are reporting progress to him on a quarterly basis. Our first report confirmed that we had engaged the enthusiasm of the staffs of Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen for the new body and given the necessary momentum to the organisational restructuring that will take place in the months ahead. We are pleased to report that the Minister was very satisfied with the progress made so far and we are grateful for his ongoing confidence and support.

7. As detailed in a statement by the Minister to Parliament 2nd April 2009, the role of Government is to set the overall context within which arts and culture can thrive in Scotland. The Minister said that, for him, a successful context meant four things:

• Encouraging and sustaining artists and creators of all kinds.

• Ensuring their work is accessible to all.

• Ensuring that as many people as possible can participate in creative activities.

• Extending and increasing the wider benefits of arts and culture, including their contribution to the promotion and development of our unique national culture and its place in the wider international sphere.

8. In the achievement of the above context, Creative Scotland has the general functions of:

• Identifying, supporting and developing quality and excellence in the arts and culture from those engaged in artistic and other creative endeavours;

• Promoting understanding, appreciation and enjoyment of the arts and culture;

• Encouraging as many people as possible to access and participate in the arts and culture;

• Realising, as far as reasonably practicable to do so, the value and benefits (in particular, the national and international value and benefits) of the arts and culture;

• Encouraging and supporting artistic and other creative endeavours which contribute to an understanding of Scotland’s national culture and;

• Promoting and supporting industries and other commercial activity the primary focus of which is the application of creative skills..

9. Ministers have taken the opportunity to recognise the importance to Scotland and Scotland’s society of the whole creative sector by embracing its interests in a single body and putting practitioners at the centre. This means that:

• Because of its resources and remit, Creative Scotland will have greater capacity and greater capability than the Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen have currently.

• Creative Scotland will engage with a wider range of artistic and creative activity and people than the sectors supported by the two organisations combined. This is a direct response to the changes to the world in which Creative Scotland will operate.

• As a new single body, Creative Scotland will champion and be an advocate for all the arts and creative industries and for creativity in and for Scotland.

• Creative Scotland’s operating model, activities and style will build on some aspects of both Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen, but largely will be a new one, designed specifically to meet its new role and remit.

• Creative Scotland will not be afraid to be bold, to be radical or to be experimental. There is a widespread recognition that it must inspire, challenge and lead by example.

• Creative Scotland will place a premium on artistic quality. There must always be a place for the excellent and the exciting – even where it is not matched to the commercial; and

• By developing new forms of partnership with other agencies and new financing opportunities, and through its streamlined business model, Creative Scotland will achieve much more co-ordinated support for Scotland’s creative talent.

10. The Board of Creative Scotland 2009 Ltd, working through our Implementation Director and with the Joint-Board and staff of the Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen, are determined to design and build a new organisation capable of delivering the ambition of the Government and the artistic community in Scotland. The new organisation has to build on the successes and strengths of its predecessors and to fully utilise the expertise of the staff transferring from the Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen. However, the new organisation must also develop new structures and processes that are appropriate to the new remit. It also has to build a new working culture that inspires, supports and develops all its staff. That challenge is considerable but we are confident that it can and will be met.

11. We are convinced that what we are putting in place will also lead to a simpler, more direct and more effective routes for practitioners to advice, support and funding. These routes will be delivered by a range of organisations working together in effective partnerships with practitioner involvement at the centre. Creative Scotland will lead the co-ordination of this activity and will make sure that practitioners are fully engaged. It will be through this new empowerment and enhanced ability to co-ordinate development across agencies and Government directorates, that the added value of Creative Scotland will be demonstrated.

12. In his statement on the 2nd April, the Culture Minister also confirmed that that the cost of setting up Creative Scotland will not come from frontline grants to artists – either existing grants administered by the Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen, or new initiatives. The Minister published a breakdown of the total cost of the transition to Creative Scotland. We are pleased to advise the Committee that we remain firmly on course to deliver the new body within the total cost of £3,315,060 announced by the Minister.

13. In line with the agreed implementation timetable, we will be briefing the Minister on the new organisational structure at the beginning of October. This is a crucial milestone and will be accompanied by full consultation with the staff of the Scottish Arts Council and Scottish Screen and the Trade Unions. We also continue to work closely with the Joint Board to ensure proper governance is maintained and that their existing service commitments are not prejudiced during the transition.

14. Can we bring to the Committee’s attention to two important announcements made in June relating to Creative Scotland:

15. Firstly, on the 18th June 2009, it was announced that Scottish public bodies had signed an agreement on how they will support the creative industries sector of the Scottish economy. The Scotland's Creative Industries Partnership brought together the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA), Creative Scotland, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, and in an agreement forged by the short-life working group established by the Culture Minister. This agreement is highly significant and formalises a most exciting step forward in working with practitioners to the benefit of all involved in Scotland's creative industries, from film to fashion to software development.

16. Under this partnership agreement, Creative Scotland will break new ground in delivering comprehensive practitioner engagement. Practitioners and their representatives will provide the information and intelligence that informs the development of the sector. This includes market and competitor intelligence, identification of commercial opportunities, identification of the barriers to growth and development of Scottish talent.

17. We would expect the new structure to enjoy high credibility, because of its engagement with practitioners, with high empowerment, because of the alliance with the local authorities and the enterprise agencies, and with high influence, because of its direct links into Government.

18. It is designed to address the barriers to success. It will listen to practitioners and understand the barriers. It will call together all the expert agencies to address the issues. It will make informed recommendations to Government as to how barriers can be removed. The structure will enable issues such as skills, intellectual property and business support provisions to be comprehensively addressed.

19. It is also designed to improve the advice and support to start-up companies. Creative Scotland will work closely with COSLA to support and improve the service provided to creative entrepreneurs by the Business Gateway network. COSLA’s new, national coordination role, which includes the setting of standards and performance measurement, is a major step forward.

20. The enterprise agencies continue to be interested in growth. However, they accept that to grow the creative sector, we all need to think broadly about growth in the creative industries and to identify and support companies who may not in themselves be ‘high-growth’ but whose contribution to the development of the sector is important. For example, companies pioneering new technologies or techniques, companies whose stabilisation will reinforce a supply chain, or ‘pathfinder’ companies who are exploring new markets, or groups of small companies that together may stimulate growth.

21. All of this further demonstrates the need for Creative Scotland. It will have the connections into the artistic community necessary to identify and nurture creative entrepreneurs. It will have the resources and remit to run a national engagement structure and the authority to lead the coordinated development of the sector. It will have the connections into Government to influence policy and, importantly, it will not be limited by history or reputation – it is a new organisation for a new challenge.

22. We are about to commence further engagement across the whole of arts and culture and the creative industries – including on line fora and a series of workshops centred round artists and practitioners. And we will shortly begin to set up a series of reference groups to reflect the 13 sub sectors of the creative industries. The purpose of the reference groups will be to provide intelligence and advice about the workings of the sector, including commercial opportunities, talent, market development, structural issues and dependencies. The reference groups will have a majority of practitioners and there will be standing invitations to Scottish Enterprise, Highlands and Islands Enterprise and Scottish local government to attend meetings.

23. Effective engagement with practitioners should produce valuable intelligence and information, better identification of the issues and opportunities and lead to a clearer strategic direction for intervention in the sector. To manage that intelligence, the partnership agreement establishes a Co-ordination Group with a core membership of Scottish Enterprise, Highlands and Islands Enterprise, Scottish local government, Skills Development Scotland and the . The Coordination Group, which will hold its first meeting on 9th September, will ensure that the agencies work effectively together, in a genuine cross boundary partnership, developing effective understanding of each other and of each other’s contribution to the achievement of the collective ambition. The Scottish Government and Scottish local government will ensure that all organisations deliver against the commitments they have made.

24. Ministers have agreed that the agencies for which they have responsibility will work together, with Creative Scotland having a leadership co-ordination role. As a single agency, Creative Scotland will seek to be more effective and more influential than its predecessors – able to represent and support a truly diverse artistic community in Scotland at the highest level;

25. Secondly, on the 23rd June 2009, the Culture Minister announced an Innovation Fund to support six new initiatives. The focus of the Innovation Fund is:

• Supporting Scotland's artists by funding new work, inspirational collaborations and residencies.

• Encouraging and supporting innovative working between public agencies and artists.

• Extending practical help to new creative entrepreneurs.

• Supporting and sustaining Scotland's artistic community and economy now , at this time of recession, by offering new ways of getting funds into the hands of artists and creative practitioners across a wide range of disciplines

26. Our board had listened to artists and practitioners and worked closely with Scottish Arts Council, Scottish Screen and the Scottish Government in developing these initiatives that will introduce £5million of new Scottish Government money. Three of the initiatives are new and three build on existing successful projects:

• £1.5 million for the Digital Media IP Fund – this will maximise the creative, cultural and commercial opportunities presented by new and emerging technologies, in partnership with Scottish Enterprise (who have contributed £1.5 million match funding) and other investors.

• £1 million for The Creative Scotland Vital Spark Awards – an awards scheme which will bring together innovative and inspirational collaborations by Scottish or Scottish-based artists from different sectors, either with fellow artists or with partners from other fields, such as the sciences, education or environment.

• £1 million for the Starter for Six (S46) – an enterprise support programme for start-up creative entrepreneurs across Scotland, extending a successful NESTA programme.

• £750,000 for The Creative Scotland Rural Innovation Fund – a fund to support innovative, cross-agency working in rural areas.

• £500,000 for the Creative Scotland Partners artists' residency fund – to provide additional innovative residencies for artists to work with communities in education, health and the environment. The Innovation Fund doubles the funding currently available from the Scottish Arts Council.

• An additional £250,000 for Own Art – an interest free credit scheme that encourages and makes it easier for people to buy original art and craft. This additional investment over the next two years will support a new strategy for galleries to develop online sales and promotion. There will also be new marketing campaigns that raise awareness of the accessibility of the Own Art scheme and the rewards of art collecting generally.

27. The Innovation Fund is the first Creative Scotland branded support for the creative sector. It is broadly based across the sector but also targeted in areas that Government believes are important to stimulate the Scottish economy and help the country back out of recession. It also leverages in up to £4.5 million of other people’s money that augurs well for being more imaginative in identifying additional sources of funds for the sector. We look forward to this money being productively deployed in the months ahead and for genuinely innovative projects to result from it.

28. In summary, the Board of Creative Scotland 2009 Ltd are seeking to position the new Creative Scotland as an enabling strategic body with four main roles that are firmly directed at and centred on artists and creativity – advisor, champion, investor and broker. We are pleased to report that good progress has been made and that we are on track against the timeline agreed with the Minister. Subject to the will of Parliament, we are totally convinced that we can deliver a new public body with the structure, staff, processes and attitudes necessary to take the arts and creative industries to new heights of excellence, access and success.