Stuart Till Jacqueline Haigh Danny Boyle

In a swipe at the Government’s current confusion over university funding, Stewart Till, chair of Skillset,

the key training body for the creative industries, said on Tuesday:

“It is a peculiar government that suggests making available extra places to wealthy UK students could increase social mobility.”

Till, a long standing film industry insider and currently chair of Skillset, a key training organisation for the creative industries, was giving his inaugural address as newly appointed visiting professor at Goldsmiths in New Cross.

In his address he made it clear that he felt the government had made a

Stewart Till, Head of Skillset

mistake in picking out science and technology as priority subjects for funding and failing to recognize the critical importance of the creative industries for the future of the economy. He said: “The creative sector accounts for more than seven per cent of UK GDP and has shown consistent, above-average growth for more than a decade.”

He pointed out that over a million people work in the UK’s creative industries, with a further 800,000 employed in creative occupations in businesses outside the creative sector:

The UK has the largest creative sector in the EU and relative to GDP is probably the largest in the world relative to its size. The British creative sector is three times as productive as its average European counterpart. After Hollywood, the UK enjoys the second most successful national film industry.

Till went on to talk about the importance of collaboration between the industry and university sector.

Extract from his lecture in the New Academic Building of Goldsmiths, University of London

Additional reporting by Neil Bull.