Nalgao’s Outside In symposium highlighted partnerships, commissions and contracting out as ways of combating the expected severe cuts on local authority arts funding. Ailsa Anderson of One North East and James Waters of Brighton-based Festivals and Events International outline how, together, following the success of the culture10 programme of festivals and events, they are creating a service that will work with local authorities across the region, why, and what they hope it will achieve.

Festivals have been identified as the ideal medium for bringing communities together, attracting visitors and changing perceptions, and since its creation in 2004 the NewcastleGateshead led culture10 programme has been supporting ambitious, challenging and transformational events, increasing participation and developing new audiences. Programmed events have animated North East England’s many and different public spaces and cultural institutions, and helped to build the region’s national and international profile.

But in April 2010, as the scheduled commitment to the Culture10 programme by One North East comes to an end, the Regional Development Agency, (one of the five core funders of the programme which also include Northern Rock Foundation, Arts Council England, Newcastle City Council, Gateshead Metropolitan Borough Council), will embark on a new, innovative approach to maximise the economic impact that events can bring to the North East.

Increasing pressures on public sector budgets, as foreseen at the Outside In symposium, are one of a number of factors that have led One North East to take a new approach, but rather than simply absorbing difficult financial impacts, the RDA wanted to establish the region as an international player in festivals and events and to ensure that existing events were encouraged and enabled to develop their potential, but also to make sure that assets in the North East were being used to the full.

So the North East Festivals and Events Service has been established, delivered by a consortium led by Festivals and Events International and starting next month after a six month set up, working with a dozen local authorities – Darlington, Durham, Middlesbrough, Newcastle, Gateshead, North Tyneside, Northumberland, Hartlepool, South Tyneside, Stockton-on-Tees, Redcar & Cleveland, and Sunderland - across the sub-regions of Northumberland, Tyne and Wear, Durham and the Tees Valley and with private sector event management companies.:

The NEFES moves forward into its first festival season with a series of purposes:

 To run a support service for both existing and new events;

 To make available mentoring for events that are still in development;

 To be a bridge between events and funders, based on the service’s understanding of funders’ priorities;

 To support (including One North East) in its decision making around its single programme investment;

 And to act as an advocate for the north east as a major destination for festivals and events.