Film companies made 630 claims for film tax relief in 2016/17, up from 535 in the previous year. HMRC paid £415m to the UK film industry, a 23% rise from £340m in 2015/16.

The British Film Institute (BFI) publishes a list of productions which successfully passed the cultural test, which is one of the requirements to receive film tax relief. Some of the films listed include Beauty & the Beast, Fantastic Beast and Where to Find Them, Trainspotting 2 and Baby Driver.

Film tax relief allows qualifying companies to make a deduction in their taxable profits, and those which don’t make a profit can surrender the tax relief for a payable tax credit.

To qualify, films must either pass a cultural test or be a qualifying co-production. At least 10% of the total production costs must relate to activities in the UK.

The award-winning TV series ‘The Crown’ and award-winning film ‘Lady Macbeth’ are among the productions to have made use of the high-end TV and film tax reliefs respectively.

A total of £2.3bn has been paid out to meet claims since the current film tax relief was introduced in January 2007, of which over £1.6bn were tax credit claims paid to large-budget films and over £630m to limited-budget films.

In 2016-17, £163m of high-end television tax relief was paid in response to 140 claims compared to £96m last year, with a total of £374m paid out in response to 360 claims since it was introduced.

Animation tax relief saw a drop of £28m compared to last’s year’s figure of £38m, whereas video game tax relief saw a £28m increase to £73m.

Theatre and children’s television tax relief was paid out for the first time this year. A modest £5m was paid out for children’s tax relief whereas £46m was paid out in theatre tax relief making it the fourth most popular.

Creative Industries Minister Matt Hancock said: ‘The UK’s creative industries are one of our biggest success stories. They play a vital role in shaping the UK’s image and reputation at home and abroad, and through initiatives like the tax relief scheme, we are creating the right environment for this dynamic sector to flourish and thrive.

‘Britain’s creative industries are growing faster than the rest of the economy and we want to keep it that way.’

Amanda Nevill, CEO of BFI, commented: ‘Worth £4.3 billion to the economy, UK film is the country’s fastest growing sector, employing over 66,000 people.

‘The UK is one of the world’s most important production hubs and the tax reliefs for the screen industries have enabled this unprecedented growth across the country, creating jobs and supporting businesses from Belfast to Bradford.

‘Vitally, they have also allowed creativity to flourish and our world class filmmaking talent to shine with productions from Trainspotting and Lady Macbeth through to Wonder Woman and Game of Thrones.’

HMRC’s Creative Industries Statistics July 2017 are available here.