NORTH Ayrshire’s MSP has pressed Creative Scotland to make sure the local area gets adequate funding.

This comes after the body was criticised following funding allocations and its Chief Executive, Janet Archer, resigned.

Kenneth Gibson questioned new Chief Executive, Iain Murray, at a meeting of the Culture, Tourism, Europe and External Relations Committee last week.

The committee heard how Glasgow has four times the population of North Ayrshire but receives funding 100 times that of the local area.

In 2016/17, North Ayrshire got grants totalling just over £192,000 out of a total pot of £66million with Glasgow and Edinburgh getting the majority of the cash on offer.

Mr Gibson told the Herald: “I raised the issue of arts funding because it is shocking that Nor th Ayrshire received only 0.3% of Scotland’s arts funding, around a tenth of what our population share merits. Glaswegians, by comparison get almost 25 times more in grant funding per capita, stimulating further investment in arts, culture and the employment it brings. “There is an urgent need for North Ayrshire’s arts capacity to be built up in order that more groups submit more applications.

“Creative Scotland admitted that the paucity of awards here is not good enough made acommitment to redress the balance. As part of the Ayrshire Growth Deal, North Ayrshire Council is keen too, to see the creative arts used to stimulate tourism and income and intend to do more to build an industry that has over 15,000 businesses and 87,000 employees across Scotland.

“I look forward to North Ayrshire getting an increasing slice of arts funding.”