Contentious plans for a huge £240,000 budget to fund Burnham-On-Sea’s Princess Theatre for the coming year have been considered by town councillors this week.
At a meeting of the Town Council’s Princess Management Committee on Tuesday night (November 15th), councillors debated the budget, which represents a big rise from the previous year.
The meeting heard that The Princess Theatre forecasts it will make approximately £50,450 of income during this coming year on expenditure of £240,433, leaving £189,983 to be funded by tax payers or drawn partly from the Town Council’s reserves.
Committee Chairwoman Cllr Sharon Perry told the meeting: “This is an awful lot of money. We need to make the theatre more sustainable. We have got to have a longer term plan. We have a working party in place to review it.”
Beccy Armory, the theatre’s Business Development Officer, explained the budget has been compiled as part of the theatre’s plans to grow its use, boost visitor numbers, and expand its programme of shows, events and activities.
Two local members of the public who registered to speak at Tuesday’s meeting aired their concerns about the rising costs to tax payers.
Helen Groves told councillors: “Looking at the income and expenditure, it is unsustainable. You cannot continue to give a blank cheque to the theatre. There needs to be very clear performance indicators and a point where you ask ‘is it unviable’?”
Alex Turco added: “The budget put forward fills me with dread as it is in a far worse position than any of us could have expected. If you are spending £5 and only getting £1 back in revenue, that is quite a gap. It seems to me that we have a fully budgeted theatre and arts centre yet the income is not coming to anywhere near to what would be expected. The challenge I think you have is not just about setting a budget but being clear as a council what your support for arts and culture in Highbridge and Burnham is to be – and what the theatre vision is to be – and then to resource it accordingly.”
Cllr Mike Murphy told the meeting he felt more detail should be provided in the budget and said the “income and costs should be more transparent.”
In a split vote at the end of the meeting on approving the budget, three councillors voted in favour while three councillors abstained from voting. Committee Chairman Cllr Perry had the casting vote and decided to send the proposal through to the Council’s Finance and Resources Committee for a further review before the full Town Council makes a final decision.
Cllr Perry added: “As part of a move to make the council’s finances more transparent, and demonstrate financial control we presented a budget for all areas including The Princess to show gross flows of income and the costs in full. In the past the apparent increase in expenditure is a result of this presentation which more clearly shows the net costs that have previously been taken directly from reserves. Whilst there are genuine increases in costs for energy and staff costs, the cost increase shown from the 2022-2023 budget to the projection of 2022-2023 and the budget to the 2023-2024 is not entirely on a comparable basis.”
“That said, now we undersatand the running costs of the theatre, we clearly need to develop a longer term plan which bridges the gap. In the short term, the council may be able to draw on reserves to allow us to develop the income streams and this option will be reviewed by the full council, however we understand this is not sustainable in the long term and are assessing what income sources are available to cover the running costs of the theatre. We are actively seeking grants now that we have sufficient staffing in place.”
