Arts Council Wales has confirmed its decision to end £1.6 million funding for the National Theater of Wales following an appeal. In a statement, the Welsh government-funded body said it considered the findings of an independent advisory panel but decided there were “no significant factors to consider”.

The National Theater of Wales, which had previously warned it would close within six months, said it was “shocked and appalled”. He said the arts council ignored the commission’s findings and set a disturbing precedent.

The National Theater of Wales said: “ACW informed us last night that they had decided to ignore the panel’s findings and refused to review or re-assess our application. NTW undertook a detailed and lengthy appeals process in good faith. …Given that the main points of our appeal were confirmed by both the first and second rounds of independent reviewers, we are surprised and dismayed that the ACW decided to proceed in this way, ignoring the principle of independent review and conveying a disturbing lack of transparency. and responsibility. “This sets a worrying precedent for the entire industry in terms of how ACW decisions may be challenged in the future.”

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Arts Council Wales issued a statement saying its board met and “unanimously agreed that there were no substantial factors justifying a review and reassessment of the application and therefore decided to maintain its original decision”.

The statement said: “In accordance with our published appeals process, clause 7.3, the panel, whose role is advisory (and has no authority to substitute its own judgment on NTW’s funding application), made a recommendation to the presiding board of that NTW the funding request should be reviewed and the reasons why its recommendation was made should be described.

“As required by the appeals process, the board gave due consideration to the issues raised by the panel in its report and considered other relevant information, such as the Investment Review Guidelines published by the ACW, which the panel described as a ‘model document’. The board unanimously agreed that there were no material factors justifying a review and reassessment of the application and therefore decided to maintain its original decision not to propose multi-year funding for NTW in the 2023 investment review. the board of directors paid special attention to the Administration since the review of the investment and that the described evaluation process was followed in its entirety. Our detailed response to NTW sets out the Council’s specific reasons for making this decision.’