Agenda and draft minutes

Venue: Kala Sangam Arts Centre, St Peter's House, 1 Forster Court, Bradford, BD1 4TY

Items
No. Item

1.

Apologies for Absence

Minutes:

Apologies received from private sector member Alan Lane and the Arts Council.

 

2.

Declaration of Disclosable Pecuniary Interests

Minutes:

There were no declarations of interests at the meeting

3.

Exempt Information - Possible Exclusion of the Press and Public

Minutes:

There were no items which required the exemption of the press and public.

4.

Governance Arrangements pdf icon PDF 183 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Governance Services Team Leader presented the Governance Arrangements report.

 

It was highlighted that the Culture, Arts and Creative Industries Committee is a decision-making committee of the West Yorkshire Combined Authority (the Combined Authority) and shall advise the Mayor and Combined Authority on issues which relate to culture, arts and creative industries.

 

As this was the first meeting of the Committee, key governance arrangements were highlighted for the committee, including:

 

·       The Deputy Chair of the Committee is Helen Featherstone.

·       The Committee was established on the Terms of Reference appended to the report.

·       Quorum is three voting members to include two Combined Authority members of Local Authority Co-Optees

·       The Committee will meet quarterly.

·       Membership of the Committee includes local authority members, private sector members and advisory representatives.

·       A further recruitment campaign for private sector members will be conducted to ensure representation across West Yorkshire.

 

The Chief Executive of the City of Bradford Metropolitan Borough Council explained the role of the Chief Executive Lead on the Committee which is to link the work of the Committee to committees and policy officers across West Yorkshire to ensure a unified approach across the region.

 

5.

Economic and Sector Reporting pdf icon PDF 296 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Before the Economic Evidence Manager presented the Economic and Sector Reporting report; the Chair summarised announcements within the Autumn Budget and Spending Review, announced by the Chancellor of the Exchequer on 27 October 2021, that could impact the future work of the Committee:

 

·       £850m was announced for cultural and heritage infrastructure.

·       £14m in each year of the Spending Review 2021 (£42 million in total) to support creative industries.

·       Two measures on tax relief for museums, galleries, theatres and orchestras.

·       £205m to transform grassroots football infrastructure and multi-use sports facilities.

·       Recommitments to other COVID related support (including Film & TV Production Restart Scheme and Live Event Reinsurance)

 

The Economic Evidence Manager then presented the Economic and sector Reporting report to the Committee. The report provided a basis for discussing and confirming the definition of the Culture, Arts and Creative Industries in terms of activities which will help determine what the agreed scope of the sector should be from a reporting perspective. It was highlighted that the report contained key statistics about the scale, composition, and key features of the sector in West Yorkshire.

 

The report examines the full range of Department for Digital, Culture, Media, and Sport (DCMS) sectors that are potentially within the remit of the committee, examining the size of those sectors and aspects of the recent performance. The report also focuses on characteristics of the labour force within creative and cultural sectors as well as education and training provision relevant to creative and cultural employment.

 

The Committee thanked the Economic Evidence Manager for the report. Members raised several issues:

 

·       How can the data reflect workers who work intermittently within the sector?

·       Heritage should be included as a key sector.

·       How can the importance of the voluntary sector be represented? It is particularly important for the museum, heritage and sports sectors.

·       Partly due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic there are vacancies within the creative industries but the workforce has dissipated.

·       Tourism is a key sector for this committee.

·       How can employment within creative industries be seen as viable careers?

·       Do some areas that the DCMS have highlighted, such as gambling and telecoms, fit within the remit of this Committee?

·       The data needs to capture the impact of freelancers and those who move between this and other sectors.

·       The Committee needs to understand the constraints to growth in each sector and understand why businesses are not growing.

·       How many people who have studied creative industries in West Yorkshire then go on to work in those industries?

·       Many employment opportunities are advertised on social media platforms, can this be captured within the data?

·       Apprenticeships in creative industries are a key opportunity to help develop the workforce.

·       Bid writing capacity is lacking in West Yorkshire. Although success rates of bids are comparable with other region the capacity to progress more bids is lacking.

 

6.

Mayoral Pledges pdf icon PDF 300 KB

Minutes:

The Business Growth and Resilience Policy Manager presented the Mayoral Pledge report to the Committee. The report provided members with an update on Mayoral pledge activity in relation to the Committee and sought their views and ideas in relation to developing the forward programme of the Committee around the Creative New Deal pledge.

 

It was highlighted that this report is an exciting opportunity for the Committee to shape how the members see the Creative New Deal pledge being delivered and how that will shape the forward plan of the Culture, Arts and Creative Industries Committee. It is also an opportunity for the Committee to consider the role that culture arts and creative industries can play in delivering the other mayoral pledges.

 

The Creative New Deal is one of the ten mayoral pledges outlined in the Mayor’s manifesto and it will be a key part of the Committee’s responsibilities to oversee its development. Initial scoping has outlined some key areas that the Creative New Deal could help deliver and the input of the Committee is sought to help shape this further. Key areas identified so far have been skills and reskilling, support for creative businesses, social prescribing, the ‘Towns of Culture’ concept, theatre without walls and the Yorkshire Youth Theatre.

 

The Committee thanked the Business Growth and Resilience Policy Manager for the report. Members raised several issues such as, but not limited to, the following:

 

·       The existence of the previous Culture Framework was noted, and that this needs to be refreshed and considered for adoption by this committee.

·       A “National Theatre of West Yorkshire” could be established in the same format as the National Theatre of Scotland and national Theatre of Wales. This could provide support and be a ‘pipeline’ for the National Youth Theatre.

·       Leadership and supporting leaders of the future in the sector is essential. Could a digital academy be established?

·       Socio-economic diversity, disability and ethnic diversity will be key to the work of the Committee. However, such members of the sector can often be ‘set up to fail’ by having far too much pressure placed upon them in a rush to appear inclusive but not having the support in place to support their growth.

·       Help to position West Yorkshire as a place to start a career in the creative, arts and cultural industries. The relatively cheaper cost of living compared to such centres as London is an essential part of that offer.

·       Placing more emphasis on taking opportunities to the centre of communities, such as creative schools.

·       How can we improve mapping of “cold spots” to ensure we know who is accessing and participating in cultural activity, and to target intervention effectively particularly in areas of deprivation or underrepresented groups?

·       How can the experience of major bidding projects, for example the Bradford 2025 UK City of Culture bid, be shared throughout West Yorkshire? A lot of expertise and knowledge is gained though the bid writing process and not just the final bid.

·       Business support for the creative industry  ...  view the full minutes text for item 6.

7.

Creative New Deal pdf icon PDF 221 KB

Minutes:

The Business Growth and Resilience Policy Manager presented the Creative New Deal report. The report provided the Committee with an overview of the £500,000 development funding scheme for the Creative New Deal pledge and to seek input to the scheme’s further development.

 

This report links to the Mayoral pledges report and focusses on how to utilise the budget of £500,000, endorsed by the Combined Authority in October 2021, to develop the Creative New Deal and to create a pipeline for future activity. The report identified two initial strands of activity:

 

Strand One:  Boosting capacity to deliver a creative new deal – This includes conducting a skills audit, developing additional business support through the Creative Catalyst programme and supporting delivery of the Beyond Brontës: the Mayor’s Screen Diversity Programme.

 

Strand Two:  Town of Culture – Progressing activity linked to the idea of supporting culture, arts and creative industries across different areas of West Yorkshire, including the concept of a theatre without walls.

 

The Combined Authority gave approval for this development funding in October and it will be delivered in line with the assurance process. The Culture, Arts and Creative Industries Committee will have a role in oversight of the delivery of this scheme and shaping how it is delivered. The views of the Committee were also sought on how best to prioritise the spending of the development funding. £190,000 has already been allocated to fund the Beyond Brontës: the Mayor’s Screen Diversity Programme and a budget has also been allocated to support the new Policy Manager post in the Combined Authority who will lead on this area of work.

 


 

Members were informed that £500,000 was the beginning of the funding and not the final amount for projects, and that a pipeline would be developed and brought through the Committee at future meetings to discuss further prioritisation and business case development. The £500,000 scheme would be utilised to support the development of this pipeline as required.

 

The Chair explained the concept of Town of Culture as a programme of creating significant cultural offerings in smaller towns and villages across West Yorkshire and not just in the cities and major population centres. Members asked if it was possible to identify areas where cultural provision is lacking, for example sports provision for girls. Members were informed that further work would be undertaken to explore what data might be available or could be collected to identify these areas. A mechanism for sharing best practice between communities was also discussed.

 

The Committee thanked the Business Growth and Resilience Policy Manager for the report.

 

8.

Creative Catalyst pdf icon PDF 287 KB

Minutes:

The Programme Manager – Creative Catalyst presented the Creative Catalyst report to provide an update on the programme. The report updated the Committee on four key points:

 

·       Indielab West Yorks: Creative Catalyst Accelerator

30 businesses in the screen content industries including TV and film production, animation and gaming will be supported to boost their business growth and promote ambitious creative ideas. This is scheduled to begin in January 2022.

·       Beyond Brontës: The Mayor's Screen Diversity Programme

As mentioned in the previous item, the programme is being funded for one year from the Creative New Deal Fund with Screen Yorkshire continuing to deliver. Specific targets have been developed around Equality, Diversity and Inclusion including ensuring even distribution of targeting of participants across West Yorkshire.

·       Export Support

The tendering process for this and closes on 5 November 2021. The scheme will deliver a package of measures to support screen content businesses in the region to create global opportunities helping them to explore and expand their international opportunities and boost their work in overseas markets.

·       Mentoring

This will deliver a comprehensive peer-to-peer mentoring programme across the creative industries. This is scheduled to begin in early 2022.

 

Members highlighted that Creative Catalyst would need a public affairs and communication strategy to be as successful as possible. This will help identify who the key advocates and allies are within West Yorkshire that are prominent in culture, arts and creative industries. Drawing on the previous item, members also discussed how the existing activity of the Creative Catalyst might be enhanced in the future through the Creative New Deal pledge development, with scoping around the concept of Creative Co-ops one particular idea.

 

9.

Date of Next Meeting

The next meeting will be held on 18 January 2022.

Minutes:

          The next meeting of the Culture, Arts and Creative Industries Committee will be held 18 January 2022 at 2pm.