The potential impact of increased local decision making on freelance workers in the UK's creative industries and cultural sectors

Discussion Paper

Partners

University of Warwick (research), Centre for Cultural Value (roundtable logistics)

Author

Dr Heidi Ashton (University of Warwick)

Editor

Trevor MacFarlane (Culture Commons)

Description

This research paper investigates how devolution and increased local cultural decision-making could affect the UK’s freelance creative workforce. Drawing on analysis of labour market data and sector evidence, it exposes how deregulated and project-based employment structures have left many freelancers in precarious conditions, falling between categories of employment law and policy support. The paper highlights stark regional inequalities, limited access to social security, and the challenges of mapping nomadic creative work onto place-based governance. It argues that without national reforms to underpin local interventions, freelancers will remain economically vulnerable and undervalued within cultural ecosystems, and calls for cooperative, cross-regional strategies that recognise the freelance workforce as the creative economy’s foundation.

Published as part of The Future of Cultural Devolution in the UK.

November 2024