FILM IN ENGLAND - UK Film Council - British Film Institute

Appendix B
FILM COUNCIL
FILM, TELEVISION AND MOVING IMAGE POLICY, STRATEGY, STRUCTURES AND
RESOURCES IN ENGLAND AND ITS REGIONS
TERMS OF REFERENCE
1. Background
1.1 In July 1998 the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) announced
its intention to establish the FILM COUNCIL. Its purpose was to ensure that
Government funds were used strategically to underpin the development of
a sustainable domestic film industry and to develop film culture and
film education.
1.2 Given the Government’s commitment to ensuring more responsive services by
devolution of funding and decision-making to the UK’s nations and regions, the
DCMS issued a discussion paper raising some of the key questions regarding the
relationship between the FILM COUNCIL and the English regions.
1.3 This paper provided the basis of a wide-ranging discussion between the DCMS,
the Arts Council of England (ACE), the British Film Institute (bfi), the FILM
COUNCIL and the English Regional Arts Boards (ERABs). As a consequence it was
agreed by all parties that the FILM COUNCIL would, as the lead body for film,
initiate a programme of extensive consultations with key players in England, and
as appropriate beyond.
1.4 The consultation programme would help the FILM COUNCIL develop its strategic
thinking and ensure that the FILM COUNCIL’s regional strategy would have
maximum benefit to, and support from, those organisations and practitioners
who shared with the FILM COUNCIL its two principal aims:
■ To develop film culture by improving access to, and education about, film,
television and the moving image
■ To help develop a sustainable domestic film industry.
The overall purpose of the exercise therefore would be to develop a strategically
effective working partnership between national and regional players.
1.5 The FILM COUNCIL agreed to draft Terms of Reference for the above exercise.
These are set out overleaf.
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Appendices
B