Arts funding outside the Central Belt needs an urgent rethink, an MSP said today, after it emerged the lion’s share of public cash and job opportunities still head there.

With Creative Scotland due to make their first financial decisions this week, Holyrood heard just 12 North East organisations got regular funding from 2018-21, compared to 81 in Edinburgh and Glasgow.

Some 10 local authority areas got nothing at all.

And every Creative Scotland job was filled in the Central Belt last year.

North East MSP Maurice Golden asked the SNP’s culture secretary how he would “rectify this disparity” as Creative Scotland bosses consider £96m worth of applications from 361 organisations, with only £40m in its budget.

The Scottish Conservative MSP said later:

“The SNP-Green government have repeatedly short-changed rural Scotland and these figuresmake it clear that the culture sector is another victim of that neglect.

“It appears as though ministers have effectively given up on supporting the rich cultural heritage in communities north of the Tay. 

Want to see more SNP fails? – Education Matters