Wintersong or Christmas
December 1st, 2009 | 
Author: Within Nairn much strong feeling has been expressed about the “dumbing down” of Christmas and its apparent replacement with terms like “Wintersong”, “Winter lights”. Much has been said about political correctness squeezing out traditional values or perhaps being overly concerned about offending those of other faiths. I don’t believe non-Christian faiths are offended and would actually prefer us to celebrate the event.
I very much doubt that there has been a conscious effort on the part of those organising Christmas events to avoid using the word. The reality is that in order to get funding to run these events, there is a need to draw-down European money. In order to qualify, events must not be seen to be exclusive. Despite Christmas being a very real part of our tradition and commonly used in conversation; marked on calendars and the focus of much of our daily lives through December, it is still judged by the powers that be as being “exclusive” and therefore cannot be financially supported.
So what are organisers to do? It is important to have a community event around the switch-on of the (Christmas) lights that involves the children and people of Nairn. The result is that we have had some very creative events that have sought to function within the prescribed boundaries in order to qualify for funding. But they have generally failed to capture the imagination (except for Nairnia perhaps) and set the scene for the Christmas Season that those of a Christian faith, no faith or other faith would still like to see celebrated.
With such a ground-swell of opinion supporting a traditional Christmas, now would be a good time to start planning for next year. Whatever we do has to be funded but perhaps it does not require dependence on European money with its limitations. Neither do we have to be exclusive but we do need something that celebrates the Christmas festival. So here’s a suggestion. Interested groups meet to plan a Nairn Christmas Festival that could include elements of the following:
1) Lights switch-on outside the Courthouse following a modest procession with a suitable theme.
2) Followed by carols and seasonal Christmas songs led by Nairn Gaelic Choir, church choirs and any children who wish to take part.
3) Later the same evening, a classical music concert in the Community Centre with a Christmas theme
4) Followed by a week-long Festival supported by local retailers, restaurants and hotels
5) To end with a traditional Carol Service
Perhaps Nairn Book & Arts Festival, Cinema Nairn and Music Nairn could be involved in helping to organise the event. What do you think?
A cool idea as long as we can get into the real meaning of Christmas – could ‘This year dump greed!’ be one of the slogans on the big screen behind the stage?
I am sure the good people of Nairn would manage to organise such an event without the groups mentioned.
Time for a change?
How about some film shows with Christmas themes – running all week – tempting folk to come to Nairn?
Just for information’s sake how much did it cost to put on Wintersong and is there a breakdown available of where all the money went?
Here is a breakdown – but bear in mind this was the budget and we have no way of confirming actual costs at this stage – which could be less.
Project Worker – Administrator – £1,400
Workshop Leaders and facilitators in Singing, Music, Making and Drama – £10,000
Production Team – £1,840
Community Participants – £1,000
Production costs – £8,250
Travel – £1,500
Accommodation & Subsistance – £1,500
Marketing and Publicity – £1,000
Administration – £200
Project Worker- Consultant (100% funded by Highland Council) – £7,200
Total Budget – £33,940
Funds came from various sources and Leader (European money) funded – £9,740 of the total
Who decides to employ a consultant?
Who decides the amounts others get paid)?
Who gets to claim travel and subsistence?
How much do the workshop leaders get?
Are minutes of the meetings available to the public?
£7,200 a nice little earner!
In isolation it’s a little frightening. In an effort to remain balanced there was a huge effort put into organising the event with various workshops being run. Involving so many young people in a community event is commendable but with the goodwill of the people of Nairn, I’m sure we could come up with something more inspiring for a lot less money.
More about Inspire’s objectives here – http://www.hi-arts.co.uk/default.aspx.locid-hianewq0v.RefLocID-hiacg5002.Lang-EN.htm
What a waste of money, I am sure that this could have been spend on the community in a different more beneficial way! Lets get back to the local children singing carols in the high street before someone (possibly other than the provost) turns on the lights.
Please answers to the questions, the community has the right to know plus one more:
Was the consultant’s job advertised?
Can’t help you with that Anon. Does anyone else know the answer to this and other questions raised? What I can say is that any constituted group is free to draft its own budget and seek funding. If the group does not have the confidence of funders then it won’t get the money. Inspire got the money! We can each take a view on whether or not this was money well spent. The group, I suspect, can then invite its own consultants, on its own terms. It’s not a job that has to be advertised in the normal way. You hire consultants rather than employ them. The group is likely to make all the other decisions as well.
Well, Im not very pleased that they left the Wildcat Cheerleaders waiting to go on for 2 hours and it ended up, that they forgot to ask us to come on the stage!
Come on you can do better Nairn! And Im not pleased at all! >:(
x
It’s fair to point out that the figures are budget forecasts, not actual spend. But even so, it is understandable that eyebrows have been raised. Look at the broad areas to which the money went:
- “actual” costs of the event (production, marketing, admin): approx £10,000
- direct overheads (production team, administrator, cty participants): £5,000
- fees and expenses (facilitators, consultant, travel & accom): over £20,000
Even if the eventual figures are slightly different, the overall balance is likely to be as shown. Is this sensible, and reasonable?
The Gurn is right to note, in his blog, that this event has highlighted the division between those (many) people of Nairn who give their time and skills voluntarily and freely to organising major local events such as the Highland Games, Farmers Show, jazz and arts festivals, and those involved in this one – who appear to have been very handsomely rewarded for a few weeks’ activity and a two-hour parade.
‘Does anyone else know the answer to this and other questions raised?’
Yes the Wintersong group do. Time for information to be made public?
Come clean with the payment figures Wintersong – No need for names just a list of all payments to folk involved – expenses too!
Well said Mal Function! Why give your time for free to community work if the person next to you is getting a nice check for ‘volunteering’!
Let’s not turn this into a witch hunt. I’m all for transparency but just stop and think about this for a moment. Many events in Nairn are run by volunteers but despite efforts to keep costs down we do need to buy-in specialists and other services. Could anyone in Nairn have provided the lights and staging for Wintersong with all the Health and Safety issues to be reckoned with? There will always be a need for paid people to work alongside volunteers if any event is to be successful.
I think the issues we have to consider are:
Was this good value for money?
Is there a way of doing it better?
Should we be afraid of celebrating Christmas?
Inspire have to be appreciated for the work they have done and do by engaging and working with young people in projects. It would be a pity to lose that. The main thrust of this thread is that we would prefer to see a Christmas event on our streets. So if you are reading this Inspire, we know things can’t be done for nothing but let’s see if we can deliver an inspirational Christmas event next year.
£33,000 divided by the number of people on the street – quite an expensive night out. Certainly not worth it.
Could have all had a Co-op voucher to the value of £8 for Wintersong’s Day!
Admin says: ‘Many events in Nairn are run by volunteers but despite efforts to keep costs down we do need to buy-in specialists and other services’
Yes but if public money is involved there should be a list of all the payments to specialists – no need for names. The same goes for the Wintersong – we should be told a list of all the payments and what for. What is wrong with that? Please Wintersong will you please make all the payments public? You say you want to engage in debate about next year – let’s have all the facts on this year first!
Please note: NairnMatters has no association with Wintersong and we can’t answer these questions. Perhaps you could put them direct – http://nairnwintersong.wordpress.com/