Scattered State support for culture

Public funds allocated to the development of culture often do not bring the expected benefit, conclusions of the audit conducted by the National Audit Office reveal. In the opinion of Rasa Budbergytė, Auditor General of the NAO, faulty model of financing the culture has to be essentially changed, as it does not ensure the transparent distribution and efficient use of funds. "National Audit Office recommends the Government to initiate the reform of financing system for culture, which would enhance function of cultural policy formation in the Ministry of Culture, and would devolve the function of financing cultural projects to centralized culture support foundation, which should not be administered by the Ministry of Culture," says Ms Budbergytė.

In 2008, the State and municipalities allocated almost LTL 100 million to partial financing of cultural projects. The great bulk of funds - LTL 78 million was distributed by the Ministry of Culture, which supported over 3 000 projects. Auditors noted that Lithuanian Cultural Development Strategy had not yet been drafted, general financing principles for culture were not determined in legislation, and descriptions for financing procedures were faulty. Therefore planning and distribution of funds is done at random, not taking into consideration the significance of projects. For example, over LTL 1.5 million was envisaged to be allocated to construction of a makeshift building, wherein centre for dissemination of information about events of European Capital of Culture, as well as a ticket booking centre would operate for only one year. Whereas the development of ethnic and regional culture - two strategically important State programmes - were allocated LTL 1.86 million.

The audit found cases when the Ministry of Culture allocated funds even without comprehensive project description, not knowing the total value of the project, potential other participants to the project, as well as and their financial or any other input. In some cases funds are allocated without submission of any project. Auditors pointed out that the Ministry allocates funds for projects, the value of which increases by several times compared to the initial estimate of the project. Some projects are unsoundly allocated much higher than initially planned sums of money, while others are allocated only some part of the requested funds, not indicating reasons for such decisions.

In the opinion of the auditors, control of use of funds allocated to culture is insufficient. Reports of project implementors were submitted behind time, with shortcomings, or were not submitted at all; they were not evaluated by expert commissions.

The audit report also concluded that State Budget funds for running of Lithuanian Culture and Art Council were used inefficiently, as it did not implement all the functions assigned to it.

The National Audit Office recommended to implement the "arm's length" principle for support of the culture, which served the purpose in many countries. The "arm's length" principle is a system whereby the State finances development of individual fields of culture, not interfering in the contents of development, instead entrusting it to experts of the respective field. In cultural policy it means that seeking freedom of expression in arts and culture, funds to them are distributed without any interference of politicians.


Full report is available in Lithuanian: Implementation of Cultural Policy Partly Financing Programmes and Projects