Creative Australia Awards

Thank you, Adrian and it is so wonderful to be here on Dharug land.

I pay my respects to Elders past and present  and acknowledge First Nations people here.

I'm very proud to have an electorate that is on Dharug, Gundungurra, and Darkingjung land.

And we've all we have all acknowledged, Jannawi dance clan. I first saw them not that long ago at the Yellamundie Festival, and I get to see them in Penrith as well. So it's just a joy to see them wherever they are. I'm sure all of you felt like that just started the magic of tonight, followed by Kirli’s beautiful performance at this lectern, I can promise you I am not going to sing.

There's so many people to acknowledge, and I want to acknowledge all the artists here, all of those who have made such a contribution to our thriving community of arts, but in particular to Australia Council board members, Lindy Lee and Kitty Taylor, Rachael Maza and Phil Watkins, the Co-Chairs of the First Nations Board and members, Dennis Stokes, Jared Thomas and Clint Bracknell and the families of Kirk Robson, Ros Bower and Don Banks. It is a fitting tribute to their memory that three of tonight's awards are presented in their honour. Your presence with us tonight means a great deal.

The Creative Australia awards recognise artists and creative workers who have made an outstanding contribution to their art forms and to Australia's cultural life. They're presented to individuals who have realised the highest ambitions for excellence in music, literature, community arts and cultural development, emerging and experimental arts, visual arts, theatre and dance.

The nominations and selections were made by your peers in the arts community, and so the awards you'll receive are just as much an expression of your colleagues’ esteem as they are a vote of confidence in your work by a government and its agencies.

The awards honour not just the individual artists, but also recognise the impact that their works have made on Australian society. In their own distinctive and diverse ways, each of the artists that we've gathered tonight to celebrate has shared their insight into the human condition and their perspective on the world that we share. There is both bravery and vulnerability in that.

In a time where we've seen many of the ties that once bound communities together, fraying, in a time where we often sense the widening of the distance between us as neighbours, the work of our artists in nurturing a shared sense of humanity is more essential than ever.

Tonight's awards are a celebration of the accomplishments of just 11 individual artists, but really, it says how grateful we are for the role that all artists play in our society. I know that the contribution that you make may not always attract the public spotlight that it deserves, but on behalf of the Australian Government, I want to say that your work is seen, it is respected, and it is profoundly appreciated.

I'm really pleased that these awards are being held in person for the first time since 2020.

The pandemic robbed the arts community of that feeling of togetherness that we feel tonight, but it also robbed many artists of their livelihoods and their connection to audiences.

We know that the arts sector is still recovering from one of the most challenging periods in recent history, and I have the deepest respect for the resilience that you have shown throughout it.

The name of our National Cultural Policy, Revive, is both an acknowledgement of the hardships the arts community endured and a commitment to you that your government will be by your side throughout that recovery.

We want you not just to survive, but to thrive.

Not only on nights like this, but every day. We understand the value of your contribution to the vitality of Australian society, and we'll do all we can to ensure that the wind is at your back.

I've said before that the great strength of Creative Australia is that it is as much a creature of the arts sector as it is of Government.

It’s a body trusted equally by both and that is why it's been tasked with enacting so many of the initiatives that the Albanese Government has introduced. And I thank you, Adrian, for your leadership as we go through that.

I'm pleased that the transformation of Creative Australia has already created so much positive change for the cultural sector.

Creative Workplaces is collaborating between government, industry and the community to create change in arts workplaces by promoting fair, safe, and respectful work culture within the sector.

Music Australia is delivering new funding initiatives to help the Australian music industry to grow.

The most recently established body, First Nations Arts will provide the funding autonomy that's essential for agency and self-determination in First Nations arts practice.

From July next year, Writing Australia will commence its work to support and promote Australian literature.

As an initiative of the National Cultural Policy, Creative Australia has also launched the Creative Futures Fund to drive the creation and sharing of Australian stories and new ways for audiences to engage with them.

Since the introduction of Revive, the Australian Government has provided further support to the cultural sector through things like additional funding to Creative Australia to support audience engagement with youth arts and $8.6 million for the Revive Live program, to provide support to live music venues and festivals showcase showcasing Australian bands and artists. Importantly, we've secured the future of our national cultural institutions and the eight national arts training organisations with a $750 million investment.

Our ambition in cultural policy, though, goes beyond stabilising and securing key institutions in the sector. Among the guiding principles of Revive is that all Australians have the opportunity to access and participate in arts and culture.

The enrichment that creativity brings to life is every Australian’s birthright, and access to it for people with disability must be non-negotiable.

One in five people in the Australian community identify as having a disability.

Of the estimated 47,100 professional artists in Australia, 16% identify as having some form of disability.

I hate to think what we would lose in the dynamism and diversity of the arts community without their full participation in it. We would fail to have a representative cultural sector.

Both before and since the release of Revive the government has heard from many people with disability, working across the cultural sector, as well as disability led arts organisations, disability advocates and peak bodies.

As Special Envoy for the Arts, it's been my privilege to see firsthand the transformative work that these organisations do, from Bindi Arts and Incite Arts in Alice Springs to Studio A in Crows nest as well as Bus Stop Films filmmaking workshop in my own community in the Blue Mountains.

The Government believes that the work organisations like these and others do, must not be seen as a parallel to the broader cultural sector, but an integral part of it.

Disability arts practice is not an optional extra or a 'nice to have'. It must be part of the mainstream. In Revive, we committed to deliver an Arts and Disability Associated Plan under Australia's Disability Strategy 2021 to 2031.

To shape that policy and determine the priority actions, we convened a disability-led Co-Design Working Group. Throughout that process, the Government received a strong message: that we need to address barriers to participation in the arts for people with disability, and that they must be empowered to be both creators and consumers of cultural experiences.

Tonight, it's my honour to release Equity: the Arts and Disability Associated Plan.

The Plan is being delivered as a partnership between the Office for the Arts and Creative Australia, in consultation with Screen Australia. The plan is a four-year program of activities to improve the equity for artists, arts workers and audiences with disability across Australia, with an $8.1 million investment in actions to drive change.

The plan builds on the five pillars of 'Revive' with three key priorities:

Priority One is to recognise artists and arts workers with disability as central to our vibrant arts and cultural sector.

Priority Two is to support strong and inclusive governments and organisations.

Priority Three is to engage the audience and provide fair, open and equitable access to arts and culture.

There is a particularly strong focus in the Plan on actions that will support artists and arts workers, foster their careers, build peer to peer connections, and connect them to potential markets.

And I'm going to give you some of the funded actions.

They include:

• $2.25 million for an arts and screen employment pathways pilot project
• $2 million to extend and expand the reach of the current Creative Australia, arts and disability initiatives
• $600,000 to continue funding the annual National Arts and Disability awards and Arts and Disabilities Fellowship
• $1.2 million guaranteed for proposed accessibility activities at live music venues and music festivals through the Revive Live program
• $1 million for Arts and Disability Services
• $600,000 for a National Arts and Disability Forum and gathering
• $250,000 for a National Arts and Disability Code of Practice, or appropriate guidelines, and;
• $200,000 for First Nations arts and disability needs and projects to be delivered by Creative Australia's First Nations Board.

In addition to these funded actions, there are a number of other activities that the government will work to deliver over the life of the plan to increase equity for artists and arts workers with disability. These will include making grants more accessible and improving representation of people with disability on boards and committees.

Centring the voices and experiences of people with disability in the implementation of the plan is critical to its success.

Building on the success of the Co-Design Working Group, the Government will establish a paid implementation advisory group of artists and arts workers with disability from across Australia and representing all art forms to help guide the implementation of the Plan.

There will be opportunities for the broader disability community and sector to have their say on key activities as the plan is implemented.

We recognise the wider arts and cultural sector has a critical role to play in achieving progress towards equality. We will listen to and work with the wider arts, cultural and screen sectors to develop and implement solutions.

We also acknowledge that many parts of the sector have experienced significant challenges to their financial sustainability in recent years.

The implementation of the plan will be a staged and sustainable approach to achieving change over time, also taking into account the varying levels of accessibility and disability confidence across the sector.

We believe this plan will chart a new trajectory.

It will help us shine a brighter spotlight on and provide a larger canvas for people with disability across Australia.

Now, this would not have been possible without extraordinary work, and I want to acknowledge the work of Marie Gunnell and Camilla Brzoska-Smith from the Office for the Arts, who are here. As well as Creative Australia's Zohar Spatz, Caitlin Vaughan, and Alice Nash.

The plan that they have been so involved in embodies the central ethos of Revive – that creativity is innate to every one of us, and that the nourishment provided by cultural experiences must be accessible to all.

Prime Minister Gough Whitlam once stated that providing access is a "central duty of social democratic governments", commenting that "all the other objectives of a Labor Government- social reform, justice and equity in the provision of welfare services and educational opportunities – have as their goal the creation of a society in which the arts and the appreciation of spiritual and intellectual values can flourish. Our other objectives are all a means to an end; the enjoyment of the arts is an end in itself".

For the award recipients this evening, I know your award is not an end in itself.

I understand that the life of an artist isn't always easy.

All artists question and occasionally doubt themselves.

All artists face trying times and setbacks.

The next time you do, I hope you'll remember the warmth and support in this room tonight.

I hope the awards you receive tonight will give you pause to realise how much admiration there is for what you do every day.

I hope they encourage you to continue making the contribution that we, and future generations will value so profoundly.

On behalf of the Australian Government, congratulations on this recognition and thank you for your role in telling Australia's stories.

ENDS