UK film tax breaks: "More needs to be done"
Kaye Elliott, head of production services at Creative England, gives us her thoughts on the new 2014 BFI Statistical Yearbook.Â
Elliott stresses that despite the industry looking so healthy, more work needs to be done when it comes to tax breaks for feature film and drama...
The recent release of the BFI Statistical Yearbook proves that the UK film industry is booming and it's not hard to see why. Our English regions have a fantastic filming infrastructure and second-to-none filming locations, with everything from industrial cities and historic architecture, to rolling countryside and beautiful coastlines.
The stats in the report showed that Philomena and Rush were the biggest grossing UK independent films at the UK box office and in the top 3 biggest grossing UK independent films worldwide - our Production Services team provided support on both of these productions.
The growing strengths of cities such as Bristol, Manchester and Leeds is clear in terms of providing a strong infrastructure offer to productions - but in light of the new and improved tax breaks for feature film and drama, more needs to be done to ensure the benefits are far reaching across the whole of the UK. At Creative England we are working hard to fulfil our remit by promoting the benefits of shooting in the regions to international and domestic production.Â
Let's not forget that production activity also has fantastic benefits for the economy too. During the 2013/2014 financial year, Creative England has supported £80.5m of on-location filming, comprising 999 productions* (including 77 inward investment), creating jobs for locally-based crew and business for local industries such as vehicle and equipment hire companies, hotels and restaurants.
The UK also has excellent cost-effective studios, facilities and superb crew that make our regions the perfect production base for both international and home-grown productions.
Our USP of working in, with, and for the regions enables us to work at grass roots level to help build the regional offer further and provide on the ground local expertise to every production shooting in the regions to help them maximise production budgets. Â
More production shooting in the regions will ensure the boom in feature film production makes an even stronger impact on the whole of the UK, and allow us to build on and grow local work forces and businesses for the future.Â
*This figure includes 95 feature films (29 inward investment) and 89 TV dramas (11 inward invesment).
