Public arts funding disparity between North West and Belfast highlighted

The potential closure of Derry’s Echo Echo Dance Theatre Company raises “serious concerns regarding the visibility and development of the cultural sector in the North West”.

That was the assessment in a report presented by Derry City and Strabane District Council’s Head of Culture to its Business and Culture committee on Tuesday.

It described Echo Echo as “a well-established cultural organisation based in the city centre, with a history of producing high-quality professional work alongside a broad programme of community participation”. 

The report also warned “the potential closure of the organisation therefore brings with it the risk of losing an active, strategically located arts venue, with implications for the broader creative ecosystem across the city and district”. 

The report’s purpose was to update councillors on the financial position of Echo Echo following the complete withdrawal of core funding by the Arts Council of Northern Ireland (ACNI), in April 2025, for the 2025/26 financial year. The company subsequently  lodged an unsuccessful appeal against the Arts Council’s decision. 

It outlined the projected sustainability of the organisation under a range of scenarios and highlighted the imminent risk to its continued operation. 

Council had previously supported Echo, Echo through the Cultural Organisation Fund.

In light of the company’s current financial vulnerability, the release of the outstanding 10% of the Cultural Organisation Fund award to Echo Echo “as soon as possible” was proposed and unanimously approved by councillors. 

The loss of Arts Council funding has triggered a formal redundancy process for Echo Echo’s core staff, with notices expected to take effect from summer 2025. 

The company’s ensemble and associate artists have also been informed further contracts are unlikely to be issued under current conditions. 

The Council report stated this presented a “significant risk to the wider artistic ecosystem, with the potential loss of talent and experience from the region if sustainable employment opportunities cannot be retained”.  

It added: “As a flagship organisation with an international reputation and deep local engagement, Echo Echo’s closure would represent a major loss to the city and district. 

“Additionally, previous public investment in the venue occupied by Echo Echo may be lost should the site fall out of use for the cultural sector. The situation has also drawn renewed attention to the long-standing disparity in public arts funding between the North West and the greater Belfast area.”

The adoption of the report followed several earlier heated exchanges, regarding the Arts Council’s withdrawal of Echo Echo’s core funding, between Maria Lynch, its operations director, and Gilly Campbell, its director for arts development. The Arts Council representatives  had been invited to the Business and Culture committee meeting to discuss the issue.

Thanking Ms Lynch and Ms Campbell for attending, committee chairperson, Cllr Rory Farrell said councillors and the people in the public gallery were “passionate” about Echo Echo.

“They want to see the organisation survive. They want to see it thrive. But they need support from the Arts Council to do that,” said Cllr Farrell. “I can’t look past the assessors reports which over the past five years have got progressively worse and I can’t see how the Arts Council did not say to Echo Echo, ‘Do you know what folks, we have major concerns. We have growing concerns about your suitability for this funding pot.

“I personally think there should have been an onus on the Arts Council to communicate those concerns and not to let them hide within assessors’ reports that are not provided as routine. I don’t know how the Arts Council did that. 

“You had concerns over the years, I have seen that in the reports. Echo Echo knew nothing about these. 

“If they had seen these reports, if they’s been furnished with that information, if people had spoken to them about these concerns, I don’t think we’d be here today. 

“I don’t think Echo Echo would be in the very, very precarious position it is in. I don’t think this city and district would be faced with losing such a cultural asset and the actual infrastructure attached to Echo Echo.”

Addressing the “regional imbalance” in Arts Council funding, Cllr Farrell added: “I’ve got a report here. It is a question from the Communities Minister answered on June 23 which shows the funding allocations for the current year, last year and the previous year.

“In 2023/24, Derry City and Strabane District got 13.2% and Belfast got 79.7%. In this current year Derry and Strabane is down to 11% and Belfast is up to 81%. The trajectory for here is downwards, the trajectory for Belfast is on the rise and we are not happy about this.

“We have had this out with the chief executive of the Arts Council and the former chair of the Arts Council. They said there wasn’t an issue with regional balance. We know there is and Echo Echo was a casualty. That’s our view.”

Defending the Arts Council decision to withdraw core funding from Echo Echo, Ms Lynch said: “Although the’re [Echo Echo’s] application was rejected for Annual Funding Programme, they were given a soft landing of £28,000, which is three months worth of what their normal grant would be.

“We then directed them towards the National Lottery Project funding, which is our second largest funding programme - grants of up to £75,000. Unfortunately, for whatever reason, they chose not to.”

Cllr Grace Uí Niallais  questioned the lack of Arts Council engagement with Echo Echo to let it know there were issues of concern in its assessments of the company.

“It’s an organisation, it’s the building, it’s the staff, it’s the community, everybody is losing because of this complete cut in funding. I’m concerned about the process that was in place, that at no point was there engagement with Echo Echo to let them know they were going to fall off that cliff edge,” said Cllr Uí Niallais. 

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Cllr Shaun Harkin described the Arts Council decision on Echo Echo as a “political attack”.

The People Before Profit councillor  said: “I think we as a district, as a Council and as an arts sector have been critical about the way the Arts Council distributes its funding  and critical also about the way the Department oversees that.

“In terms of what Echo Echo does and dance, there is no plan. You are actually denying the district access to the type of cultural work they do. 

“There is a flimsy, ‘We have other organisations in line now to take up what they have been doing’ but it is not a serious plan. 

“It looks like it has been thrown together as a justification to say, ‘We have an alternative here now’. There is no alternative in place to actually deliver what Echo Echo does.”