The multi-annual funding pilot project, introduced by the Arts Council in 1999, was one of its most ambitious and exciting developments. The council was determined to transform the arts funding culture and, as a part of this process, a group of performing arts and associated resource organisations were invited to come together and rise to the imaginative challenge of long-term strategic and artistic planning, with the promise of real funding available to make things happen. It seemed almost too good to be true, especially in a sector used to the administrative nightmare of the annual revenue funding lottery.
It was challenging for companies to respond to the invitation, and it required considerable administrative and business skills. This effort was rewarded by very large increases in the eventual funding they received; expectations were accordingly raised on all sides and at all levels. Inevitably, the most interested observers were those waiting in the wings for the evaluation of the project, following which it was expected that stage two would begin, and that more and more companies would gradually participate.
However, instead of waiting to quantify and assess the impact of the pilot project - and thereby inform future policy and procedure - the Council invited a second round of performing arts organisations to participate, and agreed to a second series of multi-annual funding contracts before any evaluation was concluded. This has led to considerable confusion, great disharmony and a two-tiered funding structure in the performing arts, with the lines between the have's and the have-not's very clearly drawn in both punts and euros.
Moving forward on a pilot project without the completion of quantitative and qualitative analysis is not usually regarded as good practice. In response to this criticism, the Arts Council's Head of Public Affairs, Nessa O'Mahony, states, "had we taken the decision to hold off from entering new discussions with other organisations until after the end of the first three-year cycle and its evaluation, we would have been criticised for creating an elite group, with the pilot organisations, and for not giving other organisations the chance to get involved".
Whatever the council's intention, this is exactly the outcome. It is a worst-case scenario which is not good for morale in the performing arts and does not inspire confidence.
Naturally, most of the companies at present in receipt of multi-annual funding are generally very happy indeed. However, Catherine Collins, speaking on behalf of Red Kettle Theatre Company (currently in receipt of £1,140,00 for the years 2000 through 2002) felt that "the funding we got did not cover our schedule, and could never be described as sufficient to meet our production needs". These sentiments are shared by Vincent Dempsy of Barnstorm, which is now receiving £708,000 over a similar period. "We only got 85 per cent of the funding we requested," he says. "We budgeted tightly in our application and have to adjust accordingly to deal with difference."
Talking to other companies, such as Rough Magic, Island Theatre Company, and Fishamble, an immense sense of relief and security becomes more apparent, together with a general consensus that proper strategic planning and development are now achievable. But it is hardly surprising that those soutside funding loop are very worried about their future and their stability.
Declining or postponing the invitation to apply for multi-annual funding, and applying instead for annual revenue funding, resulted at best in a repeat of the monies companies received For some organisations, such as Bedrock, Corn Exchange and Loose Cannon, there is frustration and exasperation as well as genuine concern for their future. Annie Ryan, artistic director of Corn Exchange, believes "if things don't improve, you can't go on. You are only hot for a short period, and the impulse goes if you can't make it happen."
These concerns are shared by Enid Reid White, the Arts Council's part-time drama adviser, who agrees that, "while deciding to stay out of multi-annual funding was not meant to be detrimental, in reality there is less money available than was anticipated, due to the enthusiastic response of those organisations who did apply".
When asked about the position of companies who might not be able to survive long enough to enable themselves to make an application for multi-annual funding - in many cases companies for whom making theatre was a greater priority than increasing their administration structures and skills - White accepted that a two-tiered funding structure had resulted.
While she personally was "very concerned to protect companies remaining on annual funding, in reality this hasn't happened yet due to insufficient funds available for allocation".
As for the thorny issue of evaluation, especially the hugely important question of assessing artistic criteria (which seems to have fallen off the table in the rush to demonstrate administrative genius), White's response is that "the Council is in the process of forming criteria for the same . . . However, after spending six and a half hours in meetings and replying to 31 e-mails, mostly relating to panic and complaints from the sector, it's hard to address the question of evaluation and analysis".
Companies currently in receipt of multi-annual funding have a strong sense of achievement and self-worth, as well as a sense of security, which is very rare in the business of theatre. It is hard to blame them, even though luck may have played as great a part as anything else in the outcome - that and the administrative capacity required for successful participation in the pilot scheme. In that context it would be inaccurate to regard inclusion in multi-annual funding as an imprimatur of excellence from the Arts Council - especially in artistic terms. This is a grey area which seems impossible to define, particularly when anyone is asked to do so "on the record".
Reflecting on the process, organisations such as Island Theatre Company, the artistic director of which is Terry Devlin, see part of the outcome as the triumph of good management and a supportive board, result being an ability to present professional information and business plans to the council.
"My board were working the way the Arts Council wanted, and we as a company were committed to making our business more businesslike," Devlin says. In evaluation, such matters are quantifiable to a degree, and companies are currently completing a vast series of forms for the Council to be analysed by the European Research & Information Service in Brussels.
However, that still leaves a glaring omission in terms of qualitative analysis. Resource organisations are worried at the implications for their future in the absence of proper evaluation. The Theatre Shop, for example, receives multi-annual funding and is co-produced by Jane Daly of Artbeat Management Services. For Daly the concern is ascertaining that "the process is secure in the long-term in the absence of the information which detailed analysis will provide. Expectations have been raised, and they must be maintained. Theatre Shop has risen to the challenge and moved forward accordingly. We are now ready to negotiate for the period from 2002 to 2005, but I don't understand how this can happen without proper evaluation, especially since the data currently being solicited through the ERIS forms does not accurately reflect activity."
All this might suggest that the increase in funding will lead to an increase in theatre, that in practical terms there will be more work produced for audiences, and that somewhere in the process more touring will result, to more audiences. However, companies do not necessarily plan to increase the number of shows they undertake, at least in the short term.
In Island they regard the question of productions as "having the resources to do what we did, but better" and of administration as "moving from absolutely miserable, to barely tolerable". This means addressing issues such as wages, conditions of employment, training and staffing levels. These are ambitions shared by almost all the companies spoken to, and certainly very valid areas of concern which have been neglected in the sector for far too long.
IN the end, though, the most important issue is what happens on the stage, what is created for the stage, and who gets to see it. This brings the role of venues into consideration, namely the theatres and arts centres where work generated through multi-annual funding is presented to an audience.
For the most part, on repeat funding, and uninvited to participate in the multi-annual funding, the venue managers are less than impressed and more than a little aggrieved at their situation. At the Civic Theatre in Tallaght, Brid Dukes is producing her own work in-house with emerging young companies on minimum funding - if any at all. She and the groups, such as Guna Nua, Green Light, Tall Tales and Common Currency, then go on tour with the result to other venues in the process, "because it's a pleasure and we can work together, instead of trying to talk to companies who are on huge money but don't want to talk to us about the needs of our audience".
Her sentiments are shared to some extent by Gerry Coady at the Watergate Theatre in Kilkenny, and Louise Donlon at the Dunamaise Arts Centre in Portlaoise; both of them are concerned that companies now in receipt of multi-annual funding still require guarantees from venues to cover the cost of touring. Venue managers, such as Mike Diskin in the Town Hall Theatre in Galway, are also sceptical about the extent to which multi-annual funding facilitates better planning, with some companies still unable to provide him with detailed information of their programme for the remainder of 2001.
When asked to respond to issues raised by the question of touring and the venues in the context of multi-annual funding, White states, "it's a free market out there in terms of theatre touring. Companies on multi-annual funding can ask for guarantees from the venues, and it is not the role of the Arts Council to police this issue. In the end, it's up to those involved to fight it out for themselves, it's their industry, the sector has to work to sort out its own problems, duke it out folks."
In these circumstances, it may well be that the best drama in Irish theatre over the next 12 months will happen off stage rather than on it. One cannot help being concerned about what will happen to the art form and the audience in the process.
