Agenda item

Agenda item

Culture Overview

Report of the Strategic Director of Neighbourhoods

 

This report provides an overview of work to support the city’s cultural offer. It highlights work to deliver the Cultural Ambition and the 2019 Culture Awards. It also outlines work by the cultural sector to support the city’s zero carbon target.

 

Minutes:

The Committee received a report of the Strategic Director of Neighbourhoods which provided an overview of work to support the city’s cultural offer. It highlighted work to deliver the Cultural Ambition and the 2019 Culture Awards. It also outlined work by the cultural sector to support the city’s zero carbon target.

 

Dave Moutrey, Director and Chief Executive of HOME and Director of Culture for Manchester City Council,referred to the main points and themes within the report, which included:

 

  • The Culture Team’s core priorities;
  • The Cultural Ambition 2016-25;
  • Cultural impact data;
  • The 2019 Culture Awards; and
  • Zero carbon and the climate emergency.

 

Some of the key points that arose from the Committee’s discussions were:

 

  • To request more information on the Winning Hearts and Minds pilot project;
  • Whether there were any further plans for projects to be taken out into the community, for example, to care homes;
  • Whether any work was taking place to engage with homeless people;
  • To welcome that all the staff at HOME were trained in carbon literacy and ask what was being done to promote this across other cultural venues; and
  • Whether all staff in the culture sector were being paid the Manchester Living Wage.

 

Dave Moutrey informed Members that the Winning Hearts and Minds project which would take place in four wards in north Manchester and was about changing people’s lifestyles to improve health outcomes.  He reported that he and the Head of Libraries, Galleries and Culture had been invited to be involved to see how the culture sector could contribute to this work.  He also informed Members that the Engagement Network was mapping wards to identify which areas were currently under-served by cultural events and looking at how to get a better distribution of cultural engagement activity across the city.  He advised that that there was a lot of interest in working in care homes but that this required significant resources as sustained engagement was more beneficial than a one-off cultural activity. 

 

The Executive Member for Skills, Culture and Leisure outlined work to widen access to and participation in libraries, leisure and culture and informed the Committee that they would be receiving a report on this work at a future meeting.  He reported that a lot of work had been taking place in the culture sector to engage with homeless people, including a Homelessness Summit.  The Head of Libraries, Galleries and Culture provided examples of the ways his service was supporting the participation of homeless people, including waiving the identification requirements to use the library for homeless people who were unable to provide these documents and providing reading material in homeless centres. He reported that further information on the work in this area could be shared with Members.

 

Dave Moutrey reported that the Manchester Arts Sustainability Team (MAST) involved representatives from Manchester cultural organisations and that MAST was involved in a programme to train trainers on carbon literacy so that carbon literacy training could be embedded within organisations.  He informed Members about proposals for the Council to embed requirements about carbon literacy training for staff into the funding agreements for cultural organisations which the Council funded. 

 

The Executive Member for Skills, Culture and Leisure reported that the culture sector in Manchester was leading the way in reducing its carbon footprint and that other cities were looking at what Manchester had done in this area.  He also informed Members that any organisation which the Council provided funding to was required to pay staff the Manchester Living Wage.

 

Decisions

 

1.     To agree to receive a presentation on the results of the 2018/19 Cultural Impact Survey at the next meeting.

 

2.     To request statistics on the workforce in the cultural sector, including demographic information, the use of zero hours contracts and payment of the Manchester Living Wage.

 

3.     To request an update on the Winning Hearts and Minds project.

 

4.     To request mapping information on access to and engagement with arts and culture by ward.

Supporting documents: