evidence: On 20 September 2019, Arts Matter Northern Ireland — an arts advocacy group of professionals, participants and volunteers from NI — claimed in a Facebook post that as a percentage of total government expenditure, public spending on the arts is 2.2% in Europe and 0.1% in Northern Ireland. In addition, Arts Matter NI stated: "If the UK needs 66% uplift to keep pace with Europe, we require 10 times that locally." [...] The claims made by Arts Matter NI make an invalid comparison between expenditure that reaches beyond "arts spend", with Northern Ireland data for arts and culture public expenditure. The claim that Northern Ireland would require an increase of 660% in public expenditure is also invalid. However, the data shows that public expenditure per head in Northern Ireland would need to increase by 105% (from £6.06 to £12.39) to match Scotland, the next highest spend per head in the UK. Furthermore, total government expenditure on cultural services (Eurostat) per head in the UK would need to increase by 45% to match the EU average.