Page 4119 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 26 November 2014
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That is the problem with this minister’s approach. She spent so much time trying to take the micky out of me. Good luck to her. We delivered lots in arts when we were in government. But we did not have a framework that said we would provide “a structure within which arts policy and the goals and outcomes associated with policy will be developed, and will guide the implementation and review of existing policies and programs”.
They are your words. That is your objective. That is what you wanted to do, and that is what you have failed to do. Your officials outed you when they said, “No, I cannot table the developments that you are asking for.” Why? It is very simple. They have not happened. The minister reads through the document of the existing things and says, “We’ve looked at the ACT arts fund and we’ve changed the guidelines.” We had a framework and 2½ years and more than $25 million worth of funding just to change the arts funding guidelines so that the minister can say, “We have spent more money and we have funded things.”
It is a ridiculous notion; it is totally ridiculous. The problem is that it is not all about the funds. It is about the outcome. It is about what you are achieving with those funds so that it is not a puerile outcome, as one of the decisions of your arts funding guidelines achieved. It is actually about quality. It is about improving. It is about feeding into the creativity, including our kids at school. There was a very reasonable suggestion in the estimates report. I think it was the Childers Group that said they want a dedicated arts officer in the education department. But, no, we cannot even do that. It is very clear. Indeed, recently at the TEDx event that was held over at the Canberra Theatre a lecturer from the University of Canberra was saying that we need more kids playing musical instruments much earlier because it gets their creativity going, it improves their coordination, it improves their physical responses and it gets their brain function going. We know from Mr Throsby’s view that it leads to much better outcomes. We see:
Creativity, it is argued, is a prerequisite for innovation … a logical sequence can be established, beginning with art …
Let us begin with art. What are the outcomes for the community? He says:
… beginning with art and proceeding through artistic creativity, creativity in general, innovation, technological process, competitive advantage, and leading in due course to growth in incomes, exports, employment and other indicators of economic success … in many developed countries the cultural industries can indeed be shown to have grown faster than other sectors such as manufacturing and agriculture over the past decade or so when measured in terms of value of output or levels of employment …
That is what it is about. It is about using the arts as a driver to happiness. Alain de Botton, the philosopher, in Art as Therapy, his most recent book, says that art can help heal individuals, it can help heal community and it can help build community. But none of that can be measured and none of that can be achieved because we have a minister who just does not get it, ably supported by the Greens, which I think is very disappointing. They are the great ones for accountability and indicators, but what Mr Rattenbury is now happy with is an update on the review. That is just obfuscation.
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