At the time of writing this report, lockdown restrictions are easing and the vaccination programme has been very successful in helping to protect much of the adult population from serious illness. The fragility of our recovery journey. This makes planning for 2021/22 challenging, with much uncertainty, however some of the following assumptions are supporting our emerging planning:

 

• The immediate and financial impacts of the current situation will last in some form for some time to come. We need to plan for the short to medium term and continue to undertake research with our audiences and stakeholders about longer term priorities. 

 

• Pre-vaccine periods of movement are likely to be characterised by major behavioural change. This is also difficult to predict, but it seems unlikely that people will want to travel far, or that they will be comfortable mixing in densely populated spaces. This will have a direct impact on the composition of our audiences and on what our audiences want from us and how and when it can be delivered. 

 

• The pandemic has led to hardship for many people, some of whom experienced loss of income and stability during lockdown. This will further impact on the needs and interests of local communities and what services they want or need from us. It is therefore critical that we work in partnership with those organisations and agencies most closely aligned to local communities to understand their needs and work to align our activity to support recovery.

    

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It was discussed and agreed that Our Strategic Operating Plan 2019-2021 will run on during 2021/22. Our Key Strategic Objectives are:

 

1. To increase access to, and develop new audiences for, our services and collections

2. To support digital inclusion and innovation across all our services

3. To use cultural experiences and services to help address inequalities and to promote personal growth and development 

4. To engage proactively and creatively with customers, communities, and partners 

5. To contribute to cultural sector debate and development at a local and national level 

6. To increase the resilience and sustainability of the organisation

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As our understanding of the impacts of pandemic develop we will undertake a strategic review of our key objectives and intended outcomes.