Colin MacCabe on UKFC

From Screen Daily today:

Colin MacCabe calls for BFI to handle industry statistics

18 December, 2009 | By Geoffrey Macnab

Outspoken British academic and film producer Colin MacCabe has called for the British Film Institute (BFI) to take over the research and statistics work currently carried out by the UK Film Council.

In a wide-ranging article published this week in current affairs magazine Prospect, MacCabe argues that the statistics compiled by UKFC “reflect rather too well on the Council”. In particular, he has challenged the claim made in this year’s UKFC Statistical Yearbook that UK films accounted for 15% of the global box office.

“No breakdown of this figure was given, making it impossible to distinguish between Hollwyood studio pictures made in this country, like the Harry Potter films, and those films actually made by British independents,” he writes. “No government can make policy on such misleading statistics.”

MacCabe, who headed the BFI Production Board from 1985 to 1989, argues that there is “still no sign of a sustainable British film industry” today, almost 10 years after the UKFC was formed in 2000. Calling the UKFC “a New Labour folly,” he also questions the effectiveness of its training and distribution policies and attacks its spending record.

A UKFC spokesperson and chairman Tim Bevan declined to comment on the article.

The UKFC and BFI are in ongoing discussions about a possible merger, which aims to streamline the organisations to refocus their resources. Entirely separate to those merger discussions, a consultation on the UKFC’s proposed new three year plan runs until 9 February.

Once the public consultation closes, UKFC will collate all the views and comments and produce a final three year plan, which should be publsihed in late March and which will take effect from 1 April 2010.

Colin MacCabe calls for BFI to handle industry statistics | News | Screen

Link to Prospect magazine article:

Breaking the British movie myth « Prospect Magazine

Labour's plans to rationalise culture

From the Guardian online 9 December 2009:

What does the pre-budget report mean for culture?

Culture department quangos and advisory committees are to be streamlined, promises Darling

The Chancellor, Alistair Darling, has already announced cuts to arm's length bodies – or quangos – in order to reduce bureaucratic costs. But in the pre-budget report he promised that a review, to be completed by the 2010 budget, will identify further options for "rationalisation" of such bodies.

Darling singled out the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, saying that the government would consider "options for rationalising up to a third of DCMS non-museum arm's length bodies, including streamlining 10 DCMS advisory bodies and bringing forward plans for merging the UK Film Council and the British Film Institute". What does that mean in practice? The merging of the BFI and the UK Film Council has already been announced (if not wholeheartedly welcomed in the film world). The Film Council is also losing 20% of its staff – albeit, according to its chief executive John Woodward, in order to counteract the loss of lottery funds to the Olympics rather than as a response to "smarter government" initiatives.

Meanwhile, the other major non-museum arm's length body, Arts Council England, is near to completing a massive organisational review, which will see 21% of its workforce gone and £6.5m in savings that will be rediverted directly to the arts – a kind of pre-emptive strike, if you like.

If one takes one's speculative cue from the Government's plans for the UK Film Council and BFI, it is those arm's length bodies (which also include English Heritage, the Heritage Lottery Fund, the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council, Sport England and UK Sport) that are seen to overlap or duplicate functions that could be required to share resources or even merge under the review. (The Conservatives have already said they would like to see a merged English Heritage and Heritage Lottery Fund.)

The advisory bodies in line to be "streamlined" include the Theatres Trust, the Advisory Council on Libraries and the Advisory Committee on the Government Art Collection. All this would be designed protect frontline services – though critics claim that such mergers and rationalisations could create more problems than are solved.

Footnote: the DCMS website contains a full list of its arm's length bodies (though, remember Darling's excluding museums) and advisory bodies.

What does the pre-budget report mean for culture? | Culture | guardian.co.uk

UKFC/BFI in a quandary

Extract from article in the Guardian yesterday:

Quangos in a Tory Quandary

by James Harkin

Nesta isn't the only organisation steeling itself for the political transition. It's a great time to be Tory. The planned restructure at the UK Film Council and its mooted merger with the British Film Institute are taking place with more than half an eye on an incoming Tory government; at the recent London Film Festival, both courted senior Conservatives with invitations to their gala events. As soon as his appointment was announced on Wednesday, Archie Norman – the new chairman of ITV – felt impelled to make a statement saying that he wouldn't "expect favours" from an incoming Tory government.

The danger is that the Tories might follow New Labour's example. Bradshaw's rousing defence of the principle that funding for the arts could be conducted at "arm's length" from governmental interference would have been more convincing had his party not sought to infuse arts organisations with the idea that innovation could be pressed into the service of immediate social and political ends – as if Twitter could renew people's interest in politics, for example, or public art could solve social ills. That instrumental approach is now discredited. The only people who benefited were mediocre artists and apparatchiks who could talk the talk.

The Tories, quite rightly, are going to have none of it. The problem is that quangos and arts organisations are still stuffed with New Labour's appointees, many in the invidious position of having to butter up the other side. Most are so deeply wedded to New Labour that they have little idea about who they should even be cosying up to, with the result that many of those lunches are going to waste. Over a cup of coffee one source, who has worked for Nesta, told me that the whole thing is "unedifying, like an episode of The Thick of It".

There is no doubt that an incoming Tory government should defend both robust funding for the arts and the arm's-length principle. A civilised country needs solid and independently minded support for its arts, particularly the difficult, challenging stuff – the real stuff of innovation – that commercial sponsors tend to turn up their noses at.

But the Tories should resist the temptation to replace New Labour's cultural leaders with their own. Tories are known for their charm, after all, but not for their taste. The irony of this shifting of chairs is that Team Cameron is still running a shadow operation in opposition, and is much too small to have worked out the finer detail of which quangos it plans to cull. In the meantime, however, they might want to beware the attentions of fairweather friends.

• Quangos in a Tory quandary | James Harkin | Comment is free | The Guardian

Overhaul of UKFC

From Screen Daily today:

UKFC announces sweeping reorganisation, new production fund

17 November, 2009 | By Sarah Cooper

The UK Film Council (UKFC) is proposing to merge its Premiere, New Cinema and Development funds to create a $25m (£15m) Film Production Fund, as part of a major overhaul of the organisation following its $41.9m (£25m) budget cut.

The new fund will be used to support all production but will have an emphasis on first and second time film-makers, and will also support experimental, innovative and digital film-making. The UKFC has launched a three month public consultation into the plans today (November 17).

The $25.1m (£15m) budget for the new fund is $3.3m (£2m) lower than the total allocated to three separate funds. It is understood that it will be led by four executives, who will be appointed by April 2010.

The plans also propose a new $8.4m (£5m) Innovation Fund that will promote new business models and aims to ensure UK film’s transition into the digital age; but other funds will be reduced or scrapped completely including the Film Skills Fund, which will be reduced from $11.7m (£7m) to £5.6m (£3.5m) and the P&A Fund which will be cut from $6.7m (£4m) to $3.3m (£2m). The digital archive fund will be closed down altogether.

Meanwhile, the Regional Screen Agencies look set to be amongst the biggest losers in the reorganisation – their UKFC budgets will be cut by 20% - but there is a new minimum target of 25% for non-London film production.

As part of the reorganisation, the UKFC will cut its overheads by 20% and it has confirmed that around 22 jobs will be cut. The UKFC’s total budget will now be $99.2m (£59.1m) over the next three years, down from $117.5m (£70m).

The UKFC has been receiving around 46% of its budget coming from lottery funds, 40% from government support through grants, and the remainder from investments and other sources; however, it has been forced to make cuts as lottery cash is now being diverted to the London 2012 Olympic Games.

Tim Bevan, UKFC chairman, said: “The support the UK Film Council has given film culture and the film industry over the past ten years has been enormous, but we’re now operating in a very different environment and we need to adapt to meet the needs of a new generation of audiences and film-makers. To do that when the UKFC itself is having to find savings of $41.9 (£25m) over the next three years is a real challenge. But it’s now more important than ever to ensure we invest as much money as possible in film production, in creative and cultural excellence, and in helping UK film make a successful transition into the digital age – and that’s exactly what we’re proposing to do.”

UKFC chief executive John Woodward added that the reorganisation takes into account the economic downturn, the lack of finance for new production and the collapse of the traditional business model as well as the cuts in budget. He said the priority was to “protect the money for development and production funding”.

In other changes, any money recouped by the UKFC from their investments will now go directly back into the Production Fund. Meanwhile, a “producer equity” scheme will be introduced that will see producers being given a cut of the money recouped by the UKFC.

According to Woodward, the overhaul remains separate from the proposed BFI merger. The BFI’s budget is $27m (£16m) a year and if the merger goes ahead, there will be savings from shared costs, he said.

UKFC announces sweeping reorganisation, new production fund | News | Screen

News on merger plan

From the Telegraph yesterday:

Film industry split over merger plan

The British Film Institute, chaired by former BBC director general Greg Dyke, has told the Government the state's vision for a full-blown merger of the BFI and UK Film Council is "not legally possible".

By Amanda Andrews
Published: 7:52PM BST 24 Oct 2009

The BFI governors wrote to Sion Simon, the film minister, and the UKFC addressing their views on the proposal.

The letter, leaked to The Sunday Telegraph, cites legal advice arguing that the much-anticipated, cost-saving deal will only work as a "partial merger".

This viewpoint is set to receive opposition from the UKFC, which is keen to see a full merger. Sources close to the film council said the BFI proposal did not tally with the legal advice the UKFC had received and argued that a large scale merger was possible.

Mr Simon announced in August that the UKFC, whose role is to channel public funds into UK film, was to merge with the BFI, the body responsible for protecting Britain's film heritage, to create a "streamlined single body that represents the whole of the film sector".

The BFI, which is a registered charity and has received £200m of funding from the UKFC since 2000, said it was only legally possible to merge the BFI with the "charity-compatible activities currently being funded by the UKFC".

It said that incorporating the UKFC's commercial activities into the new entity was not feasible. One source familiar with the situation said the film council did not understand the logic of effectively turning itself into a charity. The source said, as a charity, the new organisation would be largely precluded from ensuring the UK film industry meets the challenges of the digital age and delivers for audiences.

The source added that the UKFC would be unable to invest in making films and developing digital cinema in the UK if it became a charity and said the film institute's proposal would be detrimental to the future survival of the industry.

Culture Secretary Ben Bradshaw and Mr Simon are thought to be involved in negotiations amid concern that a deal may not happen by the time of the next election.

With the UKFC's £70m funding – which includes both Grant In Aid (GIA) and lottery funding – set to be reduced by about 10pc from April 2010, the merger has been viewed as a way of achieving efficiencies.

The BFI added in the paper that it might not be possible to merge all the charity-compatible activities into a new charity as this might be "detrimental to the industry need and cause complex conflicts of interest". It suggested that "another smaller body" might be needed to "advocate and lead on industrial policy development".

The UKFC instead wants to create a single organisation for film with a single reporting line. It would hold the charitable assets of the BFI and would have one board. This would facilitate development of unified policy, which appears to be what the Government wants .

The BFI and UKFC refused to comment.

Film industry split over merger plan - Telegraph