Cllrs urged to maintain support for MIF

MANCHESTER City Council bosses are urging councillors to maintain funding levels for the city’s flagship arts festival.

The biennial Manchester International Festival gets £1m a year from the city council and a new report argues that this must be sustained if the festival hopes to maintain funding from other sources.

Last year’s event cost £9.3m to stage and it pulled in funding of £9.5m with £2.2m coming from the city council, £1.6m from other public bodies, £2.9m from sponsorship, £1.5m from ticket sales and £1.3m from other sources.

The report, published ahead of a meeting of the council’s executive committee next week, states this mixed funding model is, “key to the festival’s future success”.

It adds: “Given the pressures on [public sector] expenditure… our ability to ask them to maintain existing levels of funding will be related to demonstrating our ability to invest at least to 2009 levels in order to maintain a world class product.”

Councillors are being asked to approve £1m a year and underwrite a further £500,000 subject to continuing financial support from other public sector bodies, such as the Arts Council and the North West Development Agency.

According to the council the festival drives the economic development of Manchester by raising the city’s profile, attracting tourists, and pulling in inward investment by positioning the city as an international centre for culture.

Last year’s festival is said to have had an “estimated economic value” of £35.7m – up from 2007’s £28.8m – and attracted 231,000 visitors, up 10%.