A word of caution

A month has passed since Arts Council England announced the 695 organisations that will make up its new National Portfolio from April 2011. The jubilations of successful organisations and the shirt-rending of the unsuccessful have now just about died down, and most arts organisations and publications have completed their initial analyses of what the new funding programme means for our national cultural life over the next five years. But there’s another story to be told about “D-day for the arts” – the story of how the funding decisions themselves were reported by both official and unofficial media outlets, and how information (and misinformation) propagated over the web.

News of funding decisions started making its way out into the open early on the morning of 30 March, in the form of Tweets and Facebook status updates from NPO candidates as they received the outcome of their funding applications. The floodgates really opened at 10am, however, with the online publication of ACE’s spreadsheet giving the full figures of its funding decisions for the portfolio. Following several frantic minutes in which the staff and supporters of almost every major arts organisation in England tried to access the data simultaneously, a picture started to emerge – uplifts for some, cuts for others, and the total cessation of funds for 206 organisations.
Journalists reading the spreadsheet initially appeared confused by its content. The Guardian’s Judith Mackrell at first Tweeted that Protein – a new NPO celebrating an award of £611,285 from 2012 – had lost all its funding. The real situation was, of course, the exact opposite. The Observer’s Luke Jennings later stated – in a Tweet further quoted on the Guardian’s Culture Cuts liveblog – that he was “bitterly disappointed to see ACE funding withdrawn from Ballet Black and Henri Oguike Dance Company.” This was at least half-right: Henri Oguike was indeed one of the RFO casualties whose funding was not continued into the new portfolio; but as Ballet Black have never had regular funding from the Arts Council there was nothing to be withdrawn.
In fairness, both journalists then reappeared with corrections – but not before their initial comments were circulated. It’s all too easy for incorrect or partially-correct information to spread once it’s out into the wild, and doom-ridden Tweets about organisations losing funding clanged around the internet –despite objections from some of the organisations involved. North London venue Jackson’s Lane was in truth happy with its ACE settlement of £396,365 over three years; although this represents a drop in real terms of 11% on this year’s RFO funding, the sum is the full amount requested by the venue. The funding decision was nevertheless reported as a “loss” by nervous commentators in many quarters.
Elsewhere, bloggers and social networkers celebrated funding increases for some companies, notably Stratford Circus in East London with its massive 554.8% increase. Other big winners included Balbir Singh dance company in Leeds (179.8%), Faceless community arts in Yorkshire (166.3%) and London’s Upswing circus company (74.5%). Stories about the uplift in some organisations’ funding doubtless helped put a positive spin on what was a dark day for some; but even here, the facts being circulated were often poorly understood. As touring companies are no longer able to apply for separate GFA (Grants for the Arts) funding under the new NPO system, some of the apparent increases doubtless come from tour budgets being rolled into funding requests, and may in fact represent a reduction in overall funding compared with the previous system.
As the old adage has it, nothing travels faster than bad news – and it’s easy to see why “D-day” provoked so much alarm in the arts community, especially from organisations facing genuine and unexpected funding cuts. But the arts funding cause is not helped by Chinese Whispers or scaremongering about cuts, especially cuts that haven’t in fact happened. Neither will we understand the impact of this latest round of funding decisions if we fail to look behind the headline numbers and examine where apparent uplifts have come from, and this may not become apparent for another year or more. Twitter and Facebook are great places for rapid comment and a good old-fashioned gossip; but when it comes to newsgathering, another old adage says it best: no facts, no story.