Last word

Read between the lines
Broadly speaking, I expect critical reaction to news that Regularly Funded Organisations (RFOs) are failing to implement comprehensive diversity and equality plans to come with a snort of some derision from the sector. The non-white population of Britain is just under 10% of the population overall; 21% of staff contractually employed by RFOs are from ethnically diverse backgrounds: so what’s the problem? If anything, should there be a celebration of the stats? Yes and no. Box-ticking culture – the necessary bane of arts organisations funded by Arts Council England – still doesn’t really provide the best reflection of how organisations work. That the staff audits above are also able to include cleaning and catering services – low-paid positions of non-power that typically, dramatically, bump up the diversity of staff – is also telling.
The other interesting points to note from the data on RFOs come from the spikes in subsidy. The top ten highest-funded RFOS received 40% of ACE’s total budget (£132m in 2008/09), which is roughly the same as it ever was. Meanwhile, the breakdown of attendance by region showed the highest ACE subsidy at £10.13 per head in the West Midlands (up from £8.84 the year before), in contrast to the East region which dropped from £10.03 in 2007/08 to £7.55 per head a year later. Dance and classical music still compete for the highest support in subsidy-per-attendance versus combined and visual arts, which remain relatively low. By the time this issue is in your hands, the election will be over and a new government (or not) will be in place; where and how this will affect individual pockets of funding, per artform, will be something to scrutinise closely.

Computer blue
Organisations can’t afford to be complacent about the broad audiences and artists they appeal to, and they can’t afford to ignore the apparent digital revolution. look at Katy Beale (p4 ) and Drew Hamment (p9), both of whom are embracing technology, without fear. There’s lots of chatter about digital natives and über techies, some of which boils down to being overly enamoured with youth. Learning from young people and their ease with social media, communications and computers, does not constitute a digital strategy. While I’m pushed to think of an organisation working under that misguided process, Claire Fox, from the Institute of Ideas, believes it’s a worrying trend. Fox has spoken repeatedly about the perils of institutions “riding on the coat-tails of youth” in the hope that it will automatically make them modern, engaging – or worse, cool. At a Cultural Leadership Programme debate last month, she emphasised again the need for technology to be viewed as a tool, and not a solution for the arts this century. It’s about what we can teach the younger generation apparently, not what we can leech from them in the mish-mashed rush to “go digital”. Sage advice that even I’d find difficult to challenge.