Lakes International Comic Art Festival Launches UK Development Agency For Comics
by Richard Bruton
Big things happened in UK comics last week, as the great and the good were at the Houses of Parliament to see the Lakes International Comic Art Festival (LICAF) announce it had formalised its role as the UK Development Agency for Comics.
LICAF have long been about more than just the actual comics festival, with a rolling year-long programme of events to broaden the reach of comics in the UK, including projects involving comics literacy in schools and prisons, but this is a rather large step into the bigger arena.
The new Agency for Comics will be based in Barrow-in-Furness, where the Government and private sector is investing in a programme of cultural renewal.
The announcement of the UK Development Agency for Comics was made at a reception held in the UK’s House of Commons on Wednesday 30th April, hosted by Tim Farron MP, all about celebrating UK comics and their importance both socially and financially. Others speaking at the launch were Chris Bryant MP, Minister of State for Creative Industries, Arts and Tourism, who voiced the government’s support for the comics industry, LICAF Festival Director Julie Tait and ComicBookUK founder Mark Fuller. (And see this article about the formation of ComicBookUK).
Politicians from all the main UK political parties were in attendance, as well as a who’s who of Brit Comics, industry leaders, and senior figures from the wider creative sector, all coming together to to celebrate the UK’s comic heritage and look at securing its future development.
This is the culmination of work by LICAF since 2014 in growing the UK comics industry through a variety of programmes, including research into the impact of comics on literacy and enjoyment of reading in primary and SEND schools, which has led to the creation of a new project to create much needed blueprints for using comics in the classroom that will be embedded in PGCE teacher training courses. Speaking from personal experience, there are still far too many teachers who still see comics as not proper reading, something that LICAF’s programmes will seek to challenge and change. But research showing things like this will be the thing to change attitudes…
LICAF has also developed and delivered touring exhibitions for libraries to encourage the interest and obvious enthusiasm for comics in young people. They’ve also begun the work of bringing comics into prisons, starting at HMP Haverigg, using comics to encourage creativity, enrichment, and learning in the prison environment. Again, this project will be working towards a national roll out.
In addition, there’s the LICAF projects aimed squarely at supporting the wealth of UK comics creatives, including the British Comics Now project, their International Rights Market, and training and mentoring.
It’s a far cry from what you’d normally expect from a comics convention, and this big step of creating the UK Development Agency for Comics shows just how ambitious LICAF is about not only supporting the UK comics industry and the comics medium but seriously working towards growing what has traditionally been an overlooked sector of the UK creative landscape.
We’ll leave you with the rallying cry from LICAF director Julie Tait:
“We have ambitious plans to build on our past work. We’re grateful to all the comic creators, local, national and international partners who have helped bring us to this point in our own development as an organisation, and the recognition for our work that support has brought.
Our work over the past decade has complemented that of other organisations and groups, here in the UK and beyond, confirming the value of comics in education and as an invaluable aid to literacy, alongside their entertainment and clear commercial value.”
Photos from the event below feature Tim Farron MP, Sir Christopher Bryant MP, Julie Tait and Mark Fuller of ComicBookUK.
For more on LICAF’s comic development work, have a look at comicscanchangetheworld.com. This year’s Lakes International Comic Art Festival in Bowness-on-Windermere will take place over the weekend of the 26th – 28th September 2025.
