Arts Council Head Honcho doesn't answer our question

From The Guardian blog:

Animate Projects:
I appreciate the difficult decisions, but the process doesn't seem completely 'transparent' to me, and nor does the 'intellectual framework'. I wonder how 'the best mix of organisations in terms of..artform' can exclude animation - the artform that my (hitherto ace funded) organisation specialises in.

Animation is interdisciplinary, cross-sectoral, something the UK is internationally respected for, award winning, digital, and has a predominantly young audience. But I can't see any animation organisation on your list, and I'd like to ask at which stage of the process, and what part of the intellectual framework, was the decision to exclude an entire artform from the Portfolio?

Alan Davey:
Animation is included in the funding decisions we announced yesterday. Yes, it's right that there is no single body dedicated to this work but galleries we fund, and moving image companies such as Film London, Lux and Film and Video Umbrella cover animation as part of their work. Remember the National portfolio isn't the only funding avenue. Grants for the arts is an open applications Lottery funded programme, through which we have recently made a large grant to a Animate, a specialist animation company.

Animate Projects:
Sorry Alan, but that's just wrong or at the very least disingenuous. Animate is indeed a specialist organisation, and supports a wide and inclusive range of creative talent that those organisations - which focus exclusively on work by visual artists - don't.

We (it's my company) are emphatically 'interstitial' - we support 'visual artists', but also animators and filmmakers. I hoped your answer might be better informed.