Creative Scotland to face parliamentary scrutiny

Creative Scotland is one of five educational and cultural bodies whose work will be scrutinised by the Scottish Parliament’s Education and Culture Committee. The Committee will be examining the spending decisions and outcomes delivered by the five, to assess how they deliver tangible improvements to key public services and whether their funding or key strategic objectives should be altered. It will be examining the work of Education Scotland, the Scottish Qualifications Authority, Skills Development Scotland and the Scottish Funding Council, as well as Creative Scotland, to shed light on “the impact of these organisations, the value they add and how effectively they work together”.

The Committee has issued a call for submissions of evidence on each of the bodies. In relation to Creative Scotland, it is inviting views on themes that include recent strategic and operational changes at Creative Scotland and how these have helped to rebuild its relationship with the sector following a period of turbulence which culminated in 2013 with a new grant-making model and change in leadership. It is asking about performance measurement, and how the organisation will ensure value for money in delivering its investment priorities. Creative Scotland’s relationship with other agencies – whose remits similarly include the creative industries – will also be under scrutiny.

The exercise also aims to assess how transparent the organisations are in the reporting of their work. Committee Convener, Stewart Maxwell MSP, said: “The bodies play a major role in public life and it is important that they demonstrate how effectively they are spending public money… It is important we ask the difficult questions to a range of these bodies. This will allow us to better understand the functions and how they work.”

The closing date for responses is 24 August and the Committee will be meeting Creative Scotland on 15 September to discuss the themes above in more detail.