Page 2613 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 11 August 2015
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What we will do and how will we know that we have succeeded
It says:
The priorities and actions which will see this Policy implemented are set out in the strategic plans of both artsACT and the CFC. Sitting alongside these strategic documents will be a number of operational plans which are to be developed by artsACT on issues such as: research and data; cultural infrastructure; communications; community arts and cultural development; and funding.
Do we have any faith that this government will do it? Absolutely not. Because in the same document put out by the same minister, there were to be plans to be developed and at annual reports last year when we asked what had been developed, the answer was a big no. They had to take it on notice. When they could not tell us what they had done, they reiterated all that was currently being done—nothing new. (Second speaking period taken.)
The arts are an important driver of the modern world. The recognised authority on this is a guy called David Throsby. He is an Australian. He has written what is regarded as the text book of the economics of cultural policy. Throsby says—this is a great quote because it really is about Canberra:
Once a logical sequence can be established, beginning with art and proceeding through artistic creativity, creativity in general, innovation, technological progress, competitive advantage, and leading in due course to growth in incomes, exports, employment and other indicators of economic success, government policy-makers tend to sit up and take notice. Since 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, rhetoric is converted into fact, and the economic legitimacy of cultural policy is assured.
Yet we have a policy that does not talk about any of that. We have a policy that says there are some plans coming, but we know that for the last three years no plans were delivered. The good news is that we finally get a bit of a handle on the economic overview of arts in the ACT. This goes to the theme I have talked about for a long time about diversifying the economy, moving away from being a land-based economy and making sure we capitalise on what we have, which is smart people. It says in the government’s own economic overview of the arts in the ACT:
The arts and culture sector directly added $426m of value to the ACT’s economy in 2012–13. This was equivalent to 1.3% of total value added by industry. Of this, $162m was associated with the arts.
It then goes on to say under “Employment”:
There were 6,456 persons employed in the arts and cultural sector in the ACT in 2011. This was equivalent to 3.1% of ACT employment.
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