Page 3002 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 12 October 2022
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about a three per cent increase, which is not a huge rise. But it is good to see that we are maintaining that. It is really great to see the Creative Recovery and Resilience Program and Amp It Up!. We have seen some good program funding coming through and we have seen a good approach there. There is a lot of quite deep sector engagement, as well as just the dollar figures. I think that is partly why those programs are getting really good results and are being really well received.
It would be great, of course, to see more being spent on the arts. We have had a little look and the ACT is nowhere near the lowest. New South Wales and Western Australia are spending proportionally less than us on arts activities, as opposed to arts capital. That was set out in the ANA insight report. But we are not at the top of the game and we have quite bold ambitions here. We have a statement of ambition. So, if we want to be the arts capital of Australia, we probably need to up our funding game.
It is really important that we fund our ageing infrastructure and that we build more, where this helps our long-term vision. I am really pleased to see that we have got funds through for some of the old facilities that are in such dire need—literally falling through the floors in some places. It is great that that is being funded. But I am still hearing that, in some instances, the funding that is being provided maybe is not sufficient to meet the needs. We Greens have a fundamentally different way of looking at arts funding. Funding our institutions is massively important. Those are our assets and our heritage and part of the character of Canberra, but we do not really consider that necessarily part of our arts funding as such.
Arts advocacy is almost always framed in terms of wanting more funding, no matter who you are and where you are. It is almost always about trying to get more dollars. It is important to remember some of the fundamental ideas that are just basic rights in other sectors. The arts sector is so far behind on the notions of minimum wages, superannuation, sick leave, holiday leave, and earning an income that you can support yourself and your family on. It is really great to see calls coming in a lot of other poorly paid and gig economy areas of work. The arts sector has been there for a very, very long time and we are still living in a world of most professional artists needing to have other jobs, with short-term grants funding, and artists who are professional and trained and at the top of their game and Australian or world recognised still being unable to live on their income. That is always difficult to see.
It is great to see some of the big visions moving ahead. It is good to see progress at the Kingston Arts Precinct. I am actually hearing really quite positive things there. I think the changeover to the management has done good things. I think the SLA managing that is probably a great thing. It was really great to see a start to some clear, transparent funding in the statement of ambition for the arts. That was the first time
that I had seen the dollars laid out so clearly. I am really looking forward to seeing that continued level of transparency. I think that actually will help everybody to see where the dollars are. We might need to have a look at how that fits in with the federal funding at some stage. I know it is not the job of this government, but I think it is still quite difficult for artists and arts organisations to understand the full funding picture, so that would be quite helpful.
I also just wanted to make a couple of comments about gender lens budgeting, which is about the totality of the ACT budget. We are strong believers in gender lens
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