COC 2013 New Year draft business case

Joanna McConway, Head of DCAL’s Arts Branch, made the comments during a recent evidence session at the Stormont Culture Committee.

Stephen McGowan, Head of Creative Industries at DCAL, told the Committee UK City of Culture 2013 was going to be a crucial year for the entire region and will have a catalytic impact on the economy, health, social inclusion and education.

The DCAL chiefs made the comments in response to a statement from East Londonderry MLA Cathal Ó hOisín who said that in DCAL’s draft Creative Industries Framework the Department expressed an intention to work with the Londonderry Culture Company.

“Given that we are virtually 12 months away from the City of Culture year, what exactly are the modalities of that and what exactly is in place?” asked the East Londonderry MLA.

Mr McGowan replied that 2013 was “going to be a very important year, not only for Derry/Londonderry but for the entire region.”

“Culture will be highlighted as having a catalytic impact on the economy, health, social inclusion and education. The Culture Company, by taking the lead in 2012 and promoting Creativity Month and promoting throughout the year, will provide a platform for further action,” said Mr McGowan.

Ms McConway explained that she was working closely with the Londonderry’s Culture Company boss Shona McCarthy on developing a bid for DCAL to support the City of Culture in a wider sense.

She said she realised 2013 is approaching rapidly and that the Culture Company was only set up this year.

However, she claimed “it has been working very hard to develop a programme, and it has brought us some specific proposals in the past month or so.”

She told the Committee: “We are getting to the stage where we can put together a business case. We are not able to fund the year for the City of Culture by just having a funding pot that does not have clear parameters around it.

“Therefore, we need a business case that sets out what we are going to fund and how the outcomes of those elements will align with DCAL’s high-level priorities.

“We do not expect that there will be a problem with what the Culture Company 2013 is doing in aligning with our objectives, as the original bid is very much in line with what we are doing.

“However, we need to look carefully at what we will fund and set that out in a business case that the Minister can stand over. That is what we are doing at the minute in parallel with Stephen’s works on creativity.”

The Arts chief said she expected a draft business case to be ready for approval early in the new year.

“This year, we made a small bid for funding in the region of £40,000 for early setup costs, but that is for the January to March period. We would like to have an approved business case by the beginning of the 2012-13 financial year so that we will know exactly where we are with the funding that we will be able to offer,” she advised. DCAL intend making £20m available for UK City of Culture 2013 over the 2012-2014 period.