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ClimateNE & Climate Change Schools Project support the move to a low-carbon, resilient economy and help businesses avoid risk and realise commercial opportunities. Posts by Jen Atkinson, Krista McKinzey and Harriet Thew » In Canada it's 40%, in France it's 20% and in the UK it's precisely 0%. What am I talking about I hear you ask.
Well, as those who visited this week's GameHorizon conference will know, I am of course referring to Government subsidies for video games companies.
Over the last 25 years, through organic growth from several major firms, the UK has slowly but surely established itself at the top of the video games ladder.
Our companies, including a number of North East success stories, have created a reputation that Britain is best when it comes to pixelated fun - a fact which was reaffirmed this year with the release of British-made global phenomenon Grand Theft Auto 4.
However, all these years of hard work could be undone thanks to the UK Government's inability to support one of the country's most lucrative industries.
In Canada, France and the US, governments give developers subsidies as high as 40% alongside other financial incentives to encourage huge levels of investment from global games companies. At the same time, the UK has become the most expensive country in the world to develop games, with virtually no support from the Government.
Developers across the country are struggling to grow and the UK is on the verge of slipping outside the worldâÂÂs top three games-producing countries in terms of value for the first time in 25 years.
This week a new campaign called Games Up was launched to lobby the Government into supporting the industry - a sector which brought around ã1.4bn of investment into the country over the last two years.
And I genuinely hope the campaign is a success especially since the North East is home to a number of unsung gaming heroes behind some of the most popular titles on the planet.
In these uncertain economic times, I'm sure there are those people who think the games industry should be fairly low down the pecking order when it comes to dishing out tax breaks.
Fuel breaks for nurses and mid-wives surely look better on an MP's CV than supporting an industry which is often linked to violence and obesity in youngsters.
But if MPs could see past the negative sensationalist press over the violence associated with video games, and embrace the industry, we could see thousands of high-paid, high-skilled jobs being created on these shores.
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