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EMCC Launch Manifesto for 2026 Holyrood Elections

Transforming Culture for a Fairer Future 

We are excited to launch our manifesto for the 2026 Scottish Parliament elections. 

Right now, Scotland’s culture and media sectors are not as safe, equal or fair for women as they need to be.

Our culture puts Scotland on the map: each year, millions of international visitors come to our country to attend our festivals, concerts and events. Scottish creative talent is exported around the world: blockbuster movies are filmed in our cities; our novels are nominated for major literary prizes; and our theatre makers, screenwriters and actors walk award-show red carpets. In Scotland, culture brings our communities together, provides employment and career opportunities, and fosters our national pride.  

And yet, Scotland’s culture and media sectors are often not safe, equal or fair for women. There remains a persistent lack of representation of women and diverse voices in positions of power in Scotland’s creative industries. Women do not earn equal salaries to men in the cultural sector, and the gender pay gap persists across Scotland’s labour market. Self-employed workers continue to be undercut in the creative industries, with 69% of freelancers experiencing late payment, and 46% of freelancers losing work and pay when ill or taking maternity leave. Three times the number of women to men cite care responsibilities as a major barrier to their work in the arts, and over half of workers have experienced, or seen, bullying and sexual harassment in the creative sector.

We know that for women who face intersecting discrimination in society – Black and minority ethnic women, disabled women, LGBT+ women, carers, refugees and migrant women, and older and younger women – these statistics are even more troubling.  

For these deep-rooted problems to improve, we need our leaders to commit to changing policies and practices that are currently holding women back from achieving their full potential. Our vision is for a Scottish society where women’s equal contribution to culture and media is fully realised and recognised, free from discrimination. We ask that the new Government commits to this vision with us and takes the following three steps to remove barriers for women who make up Scotland’s thriving creative industries.  

We call on political parties to:

1. Commit to a baseline target for national arts funding that is above 1% of the overall Scottish Government budget.  

2. Increase efforts to close the gender pay gap in Scotland’s culture and media sectors.

3. Develop and implement a national strategy that addresses inequality, including gender discrimination, in Scotland’s culture and media sectors.  

Read our manifesto in full.