Council officials have admitted that next year’s international airshow could have an estimated £207,000 shortfall without the support of council funding.
Earlier this month, South Ayrshire Council officers had indicated that they hoped to break even or come close to doing so for the September 2023 event.
They have sought £300,000 a year for five years to set up and embed the new-look airshow.
But the estimated figures paint a less confident picture, with income from sponsorship, advertising, concessions, parking charges, programme and merchandise sales, catering and VIP tickets coming to around £200,000.
Estimated expenditure, including education programmes, aviation support, event infrastructure, marketing, police and medical attendance would be around £407,000.
However, officers added that further and more detailed projections ‘cannot be produced until potential sponsors are contacted and until the charity partner can contact their potential sponsors and advertisers’.
At a meeting of the Audit and Governance Panel on November 9, officers had initially been asked to provide a robust scoping and financial plan within a month.
However, after it was stated that such a deadline would be difficult, it was agreed they would provide the detail to the panel before the budget.
However, this week they managed to bring the estimated figures, after undertaking a scoping exercise based on previous events and in consultation with airshow partners SKYLAB.
However, the panel was asked to note the estimated income and expenditure, with a recommendation that omitted any further report to the panel, effectively reneging on the agreement to present the detailed financial plan to the panel.
Instead, the report asked that the more detailed information would simply be relayed to councillors as part of the budget setting meeting.
Labour councillor Brian McGinley said that the report didn’t provide the detailed financial plans he had expected and called on officers to return to the panel with the updated figures in February.
Conservative councillor Kenneth Bell had already tabled a motion at the panel, asking councillors to agree the report, saying that ‘we could go around in circles’ and that figures were the best they could get at the moment.
Cllr McGinley said he had ‘every sympathy’ with officers, suggesting that ‘maybe it has come too soon, it may have been sensible to wait a year to make this happen’.
The panel voted strongly in favour of the amendment and officers have been told to bring their report to the panel.
It also agreed to approve the decision of Cabinet around the name of the show – “The International Ayr Show – Festival of Flight” and the charitable partnership with the Royal Air Force benevolent fund.
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