New UK report shows dramatic drop for arts and culture investment

The UK’s creative arts and entertainment sector shrunk by 15% in the last half of 2024, new data reveals. Analysis of figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) by performers union Equity has pointed to a concerning decline in the arts.

Since July – when the centre-left Labour Party came into government after 14 years of the right-wing Conservative Party – Equity has noted a 15% cumulative decline in the UK’s GDP from the entertainment sector.

That makes for an average monthly reduction of 3.7% across the sector, with the peak of decline coming in October at 4.6%. In the same period the overall GDP of the UK has contracted by 0.1%, showing the arts and entertainment sector is on a far more dramatic trajectory.

“The rapid and significant shrinking of the arts and entertainment industries since Labour took office is alarming,” said Paul W. Fleming, Equity general secretary. “Government must take urgent action to understand and address this fall happening on their watch, set out a roadmap to reach the European average of investing 0.5% of GDP in the arts.”

“Investment in arts jobs and infrastructure, which focuses on the significant economic benefits that UK film, TV, live performance and productions bring to the whole country, will pay dividends,” Fleming said.

Fleming noted that there have been mixed responses across the UK’s four nations as to the approaches to arts and culture funding. He said that Holyrood, the Scottish government, has made “a welcome Budget investment” but that Wales has done little to redress funding cuts of 40% over the past decade. Northern Ireland’s government is expected to present its budget in February 2025.

Equity emphasises the economic value of arts investment. “The arts perform a multiplier effect on the economy, with research by Arts Council England showing that for every £1 of turnover directly generated by the arts and culture industry, an additional £1.23 worth of turnover is supported in the wider economy,” it writes, quoting a 2020 Arts Council England report.

Examples of the UK’s wide-scale entertainment sector bringing in a huge amount of economic value are also given, including the UK leg of Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour which brought in roughly £1 billion (€1.2 billion), alongside the long-running ABBA Voyage virtual show which has generated £1.4 billion (€1.7 billion) in turnover since opening in May 2022 with an estimated £775 million (€940 million) in gross value added to the UK economy.

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Direct comparison with the EU is not easy to make as data is analysed and released differently. Eurostat releases annual reports on culture statistics across the European bloc, but there is no specific figure for contribution to GDP as with the ONS.

Eurostat figures on 2023 do show that across the EU, cultural employment – a significant figure in economic productivity – increased 0.4% compared to 2022 and accounted for 3.8% of total employment in the region.

Of the countries measured, Iceland had the highest proportion of people employed in the culture sector at 6.1% with the Netherlands the most of the EU member states with 5.3%. In gross figures, Germany had the most individuals employed in the sector with 1.7 million, followed by France with 1.2 million.

In terms of value generation, the most recent Eurostat figures come from 2021, where cultural enterprises generated €183 billion to the EU. This is a net figure as it’s in terms of actual value added and contributed to 1.9% of the non-financial business economy of the EU.

In the past few months, member state budgets have shown a concerning trend for culture. In November, it was revealed that over €130 million will be slashed from Berlin's culture budget as the annual allowance is cut by nearly 13%.

France's former economy minister Bruno Le Maire announced in April that the country's culture sector will have its annual budget slashed by €204 million

The Netherlands has also been slowly dropping its culture budget. As expenditure has been slashed from €1.456 billion to €1.232 billion between 2020 and 2024, funding alongside has also dropped – although less significantly – from €1.187 billion to €1.049 billion.