Question to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the proportion of (1) individuals and (2) organisations working in the creative industries who will be eligible for the emergency funding being made available by Arts Council England in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, including through the funding being provided to National Portfolio Organisations and Creative People and Places lead organisations.

While the Government has not made a specific assessment of the proportion of professionals working in the creative industries that are eligible, it has worked with the Arts Council to ensure that the application process was as simple as possible and to encourage as many applications as possible.

So long as an applicant has experience of delivering publicly funded work, and fits the Arts Council’s definition of ‘creative practitioner’ (writers, translators, producers, editors, educators, directors and designers in the disciplines and artforms they support, as well as choreographers, composers, visual artists, craft makers and curators), they are eligible.

The Arts Council received a total of 13,684 applications from independent cultural organisations and individual practitioners to the first two elements of their Emergency Response funds.

In detail, this breaks down to 3,391 applications from organisations and 10,293 applications from individuals. The Arts Council will be publishing the details of how they have awarded this funding at the beginning of June, once all the decisions have been made and applicants notified.

The third element of their Emergency Response funds, for National Portfolio Organisations and Creative People and Places lead organisations, closes on 19 May.

All of the Arts Council’s 840 National Portfolio Organisations and 30 Creative People and Places lead organisations were eligible to apply to that fund. The Arts Council will be publishing details of how they’ve awarded this funding at the beginning of July.