Why target the arts? (2024)

When it comes to criticising what the government spends money on, the arts are rarely a target. “There is a certain element that one is a philistine if one questions it,” said Galway TD Catherine Connolly at a recent sitting of the Dail’s public accounts committee. But question it she did, during a discussion on the €8.4m spent on Pálás, the Republic’s only arthouse cinema outside Dublin, even though it’s in her constituency.

The Galway cinema was first mooted in 2004 with an estimated completion date of 2009 and a cost to the state of €6.3m. It finally opened two months ago, having cost an extra €2.1m.

Connolly described it as “an utter failure in management”, while Marc MacSharry, a fellow TD, declared it “the most appalling waste and poor use of public funds”. He said: “What we have done here is build a bar, a restaurant and a cinema for a commercial entity to make a profit. I just can’t believe we paid €8.4m into a commercial entity with preferential rents and terms for 25 years.”

The cinema was initiated by Solas-Galway Picture Palace Teoranta, a registered charity. Galway city council spent €1.96m buying the site and gave it to Solas in a 99-year lease.

The project was plagued with problems from the start. Work halted in early 2014, and in 2015 the Department of Arts considered shutting it down. By July 2016, the costs were growing and work still hadn’t restarted.

Element Pictures, a film production company that manages the Lighthouse cinema in Dublin, took over. Galway city council is now renting the site to Element, which is reported to have invested well over €1m of its own money, for €1 a year on condition it continues as an arthouse cinema.

A report by the comptroller and auditor general last year concluded there was “no overall oversight arrangement in place for this project at the outset, despite the involvement of a variety of public agencies”. Connolly, who was a councillor during the protracted building stage, admitted she and her colleagues had found it difficult to ask questions about the project. This was linked to a general difficulty with questioning the arts.

Not everyone has been so reticent. Paul Ward, of IMC Cinemas, first complained to the government in 2010 about financial support given to the Lighthouse and the Irish Film Institute in Temple Bar which, he said, “were in direct competition with the Screen and Savoy cinemas”. He noted the number of “commercial films they were playing, and the state aid these cinemas were getting to compete with our cinemas”.

The Irish Film Institute receives an annual grant of about €800,000, while the Lighthouse got €1.75m before it opened in 2008. It closed three years later, because of rising rent. When Element took over in 2012, after renegotiating a better rent deal, it was obliged to continue operating the Lighthouse an arthouse cinema. Without ongoing funding, it must cater for commercial considerations; that’s why you’ll find the new Star Wars playing beside foreign language titles.

At the public accounts committee meeting, the Department of Culture’s representative pointed out that, despite delays and overspend, Galway does now have an arthouse cinema. Alas, this did not win over Connolly, nor likely anyone who had studied the comptroller and auditor general’s report.

At least the Galway experience has changed the way the department invests in projects, and a final review will be carried out this year. After that, perhaps, we can let the credits roll.