Arts Council grants: MPs concerned as huge gulf leaves Sheffield trailing Leeds, Manchester for cash awards

Concerned Sheffield MPs are planning to speak with Arts Council officials over the disparity after the city received just £6.23 per head of population from the organisation, compared to £44.41 per head in one city of similar population.

Details of grants issued across the country for 2023-26, published at the end of last week, showed that per head of population, Manchester was awarded seven times more money than Sheffield, based on 2021 census figures published by the Office for National Statistics. While Sheffield’s grants amounted to £6.23 per head of population (£3.47m in total), Manchester was paid £44.41 per head (£24.5m).

Leeds was paid nearly six times more than Sheffield per head, with £35.65 per person (£28.9m in total), and Newcastle received nearly five times more with £29.74 per head, and £8.9m in total

Liverpool received £20.02 per head with £9.7m in total, and Hull received Hull £3.05m which works out at £11.44 per resident.

The biggest of the 11 grants listed for Sheffield was £1,303,415 to be paid to Sheffield Theatres Trust, while the biggest of the 25 payments to Leeds was £10,677,102 paid to Opera North. Of Manchester’s 34 grants, the largest was £9,908,150, paid to MIF – Manchester International Festival.

The disparity in payments has raised concerns among the city’s MPs. Gill Furniss, the MP for Sheffield Brightside and Hillsborough said: “Sheffield has a rich and vibrant cultural heritage, we are home to many fantastic free museums, have a successful theatre industry and some of the world’s most famous musicians come from Sheffield. Our city deserves fair funding for arts and culture so that people from all backgrounds in our city can take part. I will be raising the matter with the Arts Council and ministers.”

Sheffield Central MP Paul Blomfield added: “Arts and culture is not only important in its own right, but is a key driver of economic growth and jobs. So we should be concerned that we’re missing out. We have some fantastic cultural assets in Sheffield and lots of brilliant creative talent, but we need to build on it. This announcement should be a catalyst for action, re-energising efforts to put culture at the heart of our vision for the city and the region.”

Coun Minesh Parekh, who sits on Sheffield City Council’s economic development and skills committee, which holds responsibility for culture, said he thought the Arts Council funding announcement underscored the need for Sheffield to rewrite how it approaches culture, as a council and as a city.

He said: “We need to be incredibly ambitious for Sheffield, to show that this is a city that champions arts and culture, and demonstrate that ours is the most welcoming, distinctive and attractive place to be.

“It’s for this reason our Economic Development Committee recently voted to adopt a new cultural strategy, written by the Sheffield Culture Collective, so that we can work hand-in-hand with the sector to attract the funding we need to meet the ambition we have for our city.”

Pete Massey, Director North, Arts Council England, said Sheffield was a city with huge cultural assets and potential and was pleased that the Arts Council would increase its national portfolio investment in the city by eight per cent from April 2023.

He said: “Several factors influence levels of investment in a place, including the numbers and scale of applications received and the ambition for growing the cultural sector. We are delivering on the vision set out in our strategy, Let's Create: that everyone, everywhere, deserves to benefit from public investment in culture and creativity. This national portfolio investment also delivers on the instructions given to Arts Council England by the government in February 2022 to disburse the additional funding it received via the Spending Review to benefit areas outside of London, with a specific focus on ‘Levelling Up for Culture Places’.

“The Investment Programme is just one of the ways we support arts and culture and we will continue to work with partners in Sheffield to realise the city’s potential and to unlock more funding opportunities in the future.”

The Arts Council says Sheffield is not a ‘Levelling Up for Culture Place’, and that it has increased its investment in other parts of South Yorkshire that are classed as ‘Levelling Up for Culture Places’, such as in Barnsley, which has seen an increase in Arts Council national portfolio investment of 184 per cent, and Rotherham, where there is an increase of 207 per cent. Its national portfolio investment in South Yorkshire as a whole was up by 37 per cent, which was slightly above the Yorkshire and Humber average increase of 36 per cent.

Dan Bates, chief executive of Sheffield Theatres, said last week he was pleased the Arts Council had supported the organisation. He said: “Over the last year we have celebrated 50 years of the Crucible and Playhouse (formally the Studio) theatres with a bold and ambitious programme, and we’ve welcomed 350,000 audience members back through our doors since reopening. As we look ahead to the future, I am delighted that the Arts Council have recognised and supported our plans for the next three years, ensuring we can continue creating incredible productions for Sheffield, the country and beyond.”

And Kim Streets, chief executive of Sheffield Museums Trust, said: “We’re hugely grateful to Arts Council England for their continued investment in Sheffield Museums. National Portfolio Organisation funding plays a vital role in supporting our work across the city’s museums and beyond. We’re looking forward to working collaboratively over the next three years to provide meaningful, inspiring experiences for people throughout the city and the wider region.”