Compliance to National Arts Council's funding guidelines

Written PQ 3096. Ms He Ting Ru: To ask the Minister for Culture, Community and Youth (a) in each of the last five years, how many applicants for funding by the National Arts Council (NAC) are found to have not complied with NAC's funding guidelines; (b) what are the grounds under which they are found not to have complied with the funding guidelines; (c) how many applicants have appealed against such decisions; and (d) how many appeals have been successful.

1. NAC provides funding to artists and arts groups in a number of areas. First, to support organisational development of professional and strategic arts organisations; second, to produce or present art and encourage Singaporeans' participation in the arts; third, to build audiences, patrons and supporters to complement artistic efforts at home and abroad; fourth, for the training, research and development of artists across various fields; and fifth, to support the needs for art spaces through subsidies. From 2020 to 2022, NAC has also disbursed additional COVID-19 relief grants under the Arts and Culture Resilience Package (ACRP).

2. Grant applications are assessed based on guidelines that are publicly available on the NAC website. The guidelines inform applicants of the conditions of the grant, such as the scope, eligibility, application process, and assessment criteria. Besides the artistic strengths of each project application, NAC also considers aspects such as public engagement as well as capacity and commitment in the execution of the project. As a steward of public monies, NAC is accountable for the use of funding towards achieving national and social objectives. Given the increasing number of grant applications over the years, NAC would also prioritise projects that are aligned to NAC's strategic priorities, such as the ones articulated under the Our SG Arts Plan.

3. In the last five years, there have been cases where applicants were found to not comply with NAC's funding guidelines. These are largely administrative in nature, such as applicants who did not meet the agreed deliverables or had exceeded their funding cap. However, the number of such cases has been on a downward trend.

4. NAC takes into consideration appeals where there are strong mitigating reasons, such as the impact of COVID-19. Regular check-ins are also conducted by NAC on the projects' progress, to pre-empt and mitigate cases of non-compliance as much as possible.