Arts and Sport Grants Cost Too Much In Bureaucracy, Say Mps

Greta Gueresi-Leach on 06/11/2008

Taxpayer-funded organisations handing out money to arts, heritage, voluntary and sports groups are spending far too much on administration costs and seem unwilling to work together to bring them down, a Commons committee has complained
Research for the public accounts committee shows the nine main grant-givers sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) gave £1.8bn in 2006-07. A further £200m was spent administering the grants.

Not only did they not know how much different grants were costing administratively, but the costs varied widely. In one case it cost the Big Lottery Fund for good causes 3p for each pound given, compared with the 35p spent in every pound by the Arts Council for grants to individuals.

The committee looked at grants from £200 to many millions and found there was little joined-up thinking. It said the example of the US should be followed, where applications for grants can be made online at a one-stop website.

Edward Leigh, the public accounts committee chairman, described the amount spent on administration as "very hefty". He added: "Any organisation awarding grants should know the cost of administering each of its individual grant programmes and how that cost compares with others."

He said the DCMS had done little to encourage the bodies to compare costs. "This makes it all the harder to identify inefficient and wasteful practices."

Leigh added: "There are substantial differences across the sector in the cost of grant-making, even though administrative processes tend to be similar. This shows that grant-makers must do a lot more to share information and learn from each other, so that administrative costs can be driven down.

"So far they have been conspicuously unwilling to work together or to contemplate sharing services, systems or office accommodation. Taxpayers will share this committee's impatience that progress in this area has been so slow."
Source: The Guardian

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