New figures published yesterday – January 13th –  reveal that the Creative Industries are now worth £76.9 billlion per year to the UK economy – an all-time high. That figure is too big to get my head around so I’m glad that people good at maths have worked out that it equates to:-
£8.8 million per hour
£146,000 every single minute

That’s still just numbers and I prefer to think in concrete images. I’ve spent a few minutes googling official statistics and discovered that £76.9 billion could pay for:
all government spending for one year on cancer, heart and circulation disease, and mental health (the top three categories)
(source: Nuffield Trust )
AND
all government spending for one year on primary schools – that’s every single primary school in the country
(source: House of Commons Library statistics on education: December 2014)
AND
pay for all the cuts George Osborne says will be needed after the 2015 election – most of which would come from welfare.
(source: BBC news report January 6th)
AND
There would be change left over….

So that’s what  the creative industries – film, television, music, books – put into the economy. It is also responsible for 5.5% of all the jobs in the UK and nearly 10% of exports.
(source:Department of Culture, Media and Sport)

Given all those figures I can see how  every £1 spent on arts funding actually produces £4 for the country but the Conservatives have pledged to cut that funding if they win the May general election. Last week the Labour Press team issued the following tweet: