Edinburgh festivals move step closer to 25% boost from tourist tax
Levy introduced last month means visitors staying overnight pay extra 5 per cent
The Edinburgh Festivals could soon be getting a 25 per cent funding boost on the back of the city’s new tourist tax.
The visitor levy came into effect in the capital last month, meaning visitors staying in Edinburgh overnight need to pay a 5 per cent tax.
Festival bosses had been calling for some of the £50 million the tax is expected to generate to be ploughed back into their organisations, saying a lack of council funding risks turning the festivals into a “playground for the wealthy”.
Councillors on Edinburgh’s culture committee have now backed proposals to ringfence £1.4m of income from the city’s tourist tax to increase support for the festivals and other major events.
Amongst the festival directors who spoke at the council meeting on Friday were Nicola Benedetti, director of the Edinburgh International Festival, Fringe Society chief executive Tony Lankester, Edinburgh Book Festival director Jenny Niven and Festivals Edinburgh director Lori Anderson.
Ms Benedetti said: “The international perspective on Scotland is hugely impacted by that of the Edinburgh Festivals and the fact that we claim this as the world’s festival city is no small claim.
“It travels around the world, and it comes back to us.
“We are only what we are because of our diversity and our combined impact in giving back to the city.
“From the perspective of the wider Scotland integration, with education and community at its heart, not working together to protect that core is something that will have a knock-on effect that may take 10 years to really show, but it will impact absolutely everybody.”
Mr Lankester added: “This should not be a zero-sum game. A more strategic approach would look at the available pot and the best strategic way to deploy that pot to make sure this remains one of the world’s great cultural capitals.
“We are not seeing that in the outputs from the council at the moment and we are not seeing that in the decisions that have been taken.
“It all points to a fundamental flaw in the strategy and approach.
“This isn’t ‘The Hunger Games’ where everyone is put up against each other - it shouldn’t be like that at all.”
Council officials had wanted to cap any increases in funding for the festivals to 11.5 per cent, and to ringfence a £2m pot for a new fund to support culture organisations across the city.
Committee convener Margaret Arma Graham had argued the festivals were “only one of the pegs that our reputation as a city hangs on”, pointing Edinburgh University, Murrayfield and the city’s football clubs as alternative draws.
She said the “narrative around August” needs to change, with the city moving to a year-round community-based approach to culture.
She said: “To my mind, culture needs to grow not only in the city centre, but in our communities and be allowed to flourish with their ideas, working in communities, not for communities.
“This is an important distinction that has probably been missed.”
However SNP and Lib Dem councillors voted in favour of a 25 per cent increase.
The proposals agreed on by the culture committee will now go before a meeting of the full council.
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