The UK Film Council (UKFC) has set out its funding plans up to 2010, which include
the creation of five new funding priorities aimed at boosting public access to film. Published in the document Film in the Digital Age, plans include a UK Film Festivals Fund worth £1.5m a year, designed to create a thriving film festival scene in the UK.
Also announced was a Partnership Challenge Fund worth £1m a year, aimed at bringing new funding partnerships together to widen public participation in film.
Media literacy and film education, cinema capital funding, cinema access and inclusion initiatives, and London 2012 Olympic-related film initiatives all listed as initial funding priorities. Other measures include a UK Digital Film Archives Fund worth £1m a year, and a £2m Digitisation and Marketing Fund, which is said to build on the existing Prints and Advertising Fund, with additional funding focusing on wider theatrical and online distribution of British and specialised film. The new priorities come after an extensive consultation earlier this year, and are said to have won clear backing from across& the film industry. The UKFC also said it will continue with all its existing funding priorities at the same financial level.