The umbrella organisation yesterday sent a letter to Minister for Creative Industries Martin Foley thanking him for his consultation with the industry in his early days in office and suggesting he now move onto action.
The letter emphasised the importance of the small-to-medium performing arts sector in creating vitality and maintaining Victoria’s vaunted position as ‘the State of the Arts’.
It also drew attention to the poor working conditions in the arts, citing TNV’s survey, which showed that the average salary for a General Manager/Executive Producer in the small to medium sector was $71,950 and for Artistic Directors $70,418. The average CEO salary for the NFP Sector as a whole was $102,475, according to Pro Bono Australia (2013).
TNV has identified four calls to action for the new Victorian Government:
1. A comprehensive, whole of government Cultural Policy
This policy was one of the Government’s election platform. ‘We support this intention and we only urge that the government consults deeply with artists, companies and communities and ensures that diversity is a key driver of the Policy, not an add-on. We also urge that artists and their needs are put at the centre of the Policy,’ TNV Director Nicole Beyer wrote.
2. A funding review
Dissatisfaction with the former Liberal Government’s 2012 Organisation Investment Program (OIP) Review has prompted TNV to call for another Review by the new Government.
In particular, TNV said many artists were being limited by a condition that they could only have one grant at a time.
‘We implore Creative Victoria to urgently remove the criterion that a grant must be complete and acquitted before another grant is applied for – this is stifling many extraordinary artists’ careers and would be easily revoked.’
TNV has prepared an analysis of the current OIP program, which shows a need for a $3 million to $5 million increase to maintain some ‘renewal’ of organisations (a key reason OIP was established) and to ensure fewer than 10 organisations are defunded in the next triennium (2017-2019).
3. A Small to Medium Capacity Building Fund
TNV suggests this fund replace Expert Arts and is used to enable artists, companies and service organisations to access professional development, in particular to support skills development, tools and programs to develop and implement ‘cultural solutions for civic problems’.
4. Better data
Creative Victoria collects data which is currently aggregated into Arts Funding Data. TNV said this aggregation is too high level to be useful to individual small-to-medium companies. It wants additional aggregation by size and organisation type to allow useful useful comparison, supporting companies to advocate for themselves, seek other sources of income, and ultimately become more sustainable.
