Minister’s meeting: Is bigger always better?

by Caroline_Norbury on 13-Apr-11 17:18

Topics of scale, growth, tax credits and intellectual property and were among those discussed at our private meeting with the Minister for Culture, Communications and Creative Industries, Ed Vaizey, and creative businesses from Bristol and Bath last week.

The meeting, which took place at Aardman Animations on Friday 8 April, was part of the Minister’s visit to Bristol and Bath on 7-8 April, and was arranged by South West Screen and Aardman.

Kip Meek (South West Screen Chairman); Caroline Norbury (South West Screen Chief Executive), Ed Vaizey (Minister for Culture, Communications and Creative Industries), and David Sproxton (Executive Chairman, Aardman Animations)

Following a tour of the Academy Award-winning animation studios’ new premises, the Minister sat down with representatives from Aardman, Future Publishing, Wonky Films. Proctor and Stevenson, Touch Productions, Fluffy Logic, Team Rubber, Sift Media, TLT Solicitors, HP Labs, Walk Tall Media, Icon Films, the BBC and South West Screen’s iFeatures scheme. Top of the agenda for discussion was the landscape of the local creative sector.

The meeting discussed the barriers to growth the creative industries face. The issues raised included finding the right kind of finance, the need to protect IP, tax breaks and increasing public procurement from SMEs.

The UK’s creative industries continue to buck the traditional models for growth and scale - Aardman is a case in point.  Firmly rooted in Bristol, about 40% of its CGI animation staff are foreign nationals, it’s location in the West of England is a happy accident of history and a commitment to growing iteratively and with a passion and conviction for the good things in life.  It is part of a diverse ecology that supports a range of smaller creative enterprises and plays a full role in the city region’s cultural life.  It has had partnerships with major US studios but always remained committed to an “Aardman approach” rather than the imperative of the bottom-line.

The UK is full of creative businesses with the potential for more growth and prosperity, and our discussion gave us a good chance to look at some key ways to unlock that growth. However, perhaps it is also worth noting that it’s precisely because the UK creative sector is not homogenous that it can be adaptable, nimble and competitive, so the range of size and scale of its businesses also needs to be embraced.

This chimes with the ethos throughout E F Schumacher’s Small is Beautiful, which sprang to my mind following the meeting. The book was one of a shortlist of essential  texts that my economics tutor ordered me to read as an A’ level student in the 1980s.  Schumacher – who one could assert is as much a philosopher as he is an economist - has been in the news recently, purportedly because of the coalition government’s support for many of his ideas:  the breaking up of large institutions into smaller organisations; the decentralisation of power; the importance of public and civic service and reciprocity, or in popular parlance – what goes around, comes around.  

In many ways the creative sector, particularly out of London, exemplifies, Schumacher’s doctrine - small, regional working units utilising local labour and resources, with space and room for human creativity, many seeking to combine business with a way of life where profit is not the only motive.

Upon a quick read through my original Small is Beautiful paperback I noted one of the few pages I’d made any notes, p140:  “Development does not start with goods; it starts with people and their education, organisation and discipline.  Without these three, all resources remain latent, untapped potential.”

Tagged:Caroline Norbury, Ed Vaizey

Please login or register to comment