Things are moving inside the crisis at Creative Scotland, the national arts funding body.
Surely and steadily.
You may remember that the board of Creative Scotland, which is led by chairman Sir Sandy Crombie, instigated two internal reviews, or inquiries, both to be led by board members.
The first is focussed on ‘operations’ at the body, and is led by journalist Ruth Wishart, and the second is focussed on the National Lottery and what can be done with it, and is led by Barclay Price.
I understand that Ms Wishart’s review is done, and indeed an interim version is now being read by the board and the executive team at Waverley Gate.
Given the ongoing furore over Creative Scotland, given extra impetus in the past week with the row over the all-male panel for their Awards, it would be nice if the report was made available to the public.
But I am not holding my breath for an imminent release. I think we may see it, or at least a summation of it, after the next Board meeting - which could be a dramatic event - on 6 December.
One of the most alarming and concerning aspects of the whole Creative Scotland story has been the outbreaks of fear and trembling and alarm felt both inside and outside the body, among the creative community and outside it.
It is a sorry situation when artists feel genuinely afraid, whether that is justified or not, of speaking out, where people are harangued by email or in person for expressing honestly held opinions, when newspapers receive anonymous letters accusing us of following some kind of malevolent agenda, where dark jokes of ‘never working in this town again’ are exchanged, where worried people ring me in tears over something they may or may have not said and how it may be perceived, and where blameless and talented staff inside Creative Scotland worry about their futures amid the tumult.
If there is no other reason to sort this whole sorry mess out - and there are plenty - removing the fear and loathing and suspicion from the discourse in the artistic and cultural community will be a very welcome result.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article