Tiga calls for better financial records to aid industry

Tiga has called for the UK government to begin recording the level of support it is giving to specific business sectors in order for it to better support UK games developers.

Parliamentary-under-secretary Barbara Follett revealed back in March that the government was unable to provide information detailing exactly which trades and businesses were receiving financial support, saying: "We do not have the specific figures broken down by sector or year."

Richard Wilson, CEO of Tiga today brought up the issue, highlighting how these missing figures could result in the UK games industry not getting the support it deserves.

"The UK games development sector is export oriented. 46 per cent of a typical developer's turnover is generated through exports. In 2005, the games sector contributed GBP 200 million to the UK’s balance of trade," he said.

"We need to support the game development sector, an important UK export success story. However, the government cannot make informed decisions about the level of support which it should give to the sector via UK Trade & Industry unless it begins to record expenditure for specific sectors to include games development."

As Wilson pointed out, the government's UK Trade & Investment UKT&I organisation can provide very useful support to small to medium-sized businesses, enabling them to apply for grants and participate in overseas trade fairs in the hope of boosting export trade.

"The UK recorded a deficit on trade in goods and services of GBP 3 billion in April 2009 and a deficit of GBP 52.6 billion in 2007. We need to rebalance the economy and support those sectors with a high propensity to export in order to help narrow the trade deficit," he continued, claiming that in order to do so the government needs to "rectify this deficiency".