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MAHATMA GANDHI ~ Truth never damages a cause that is just.
Thursday, 25 June 2020
The arts and recreation sector stimulus was long promised. It is probably too little, far too late.
A hand sanitiser station at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney.
Nearly one in five of all Australian businesses in the arts and
recreation industry are no longer trading due to the coronavirus
pandemic.
Photograph: Ryan Pierse/Getty Images
On
the day the ABC announced massive cuts and new data from the Australian
Bureau of Statistics revealed just how massively the arts and
recreation industry has been damaged, the government finally announced a
rescue package for the arts sector.
The package includes a $75m grant program that will provide capital
to help Australian production and events businesses, with grants ranging
from $75,000 to $2m.
The package is worth $250m – somewhat less than the $345m the industry was hoping to receive.
It comes as the latest ABS data on the business impact of Covid-19
points to the ongoing crisis in the economy and especially the arts
sector.
In the week of 10 to 17 June, 73% of all businesses were operating under modified arrangements due to the virus.
The most greatly affected industries were in the accommodation and
food services sector, with just 8% of all businesses in that industry
operating as normal: These latest figures are able to give a more detailed picture than
those in May, which only provided data on businesses currently trading.
And
while the overall “impact” for the arts and recreation industry may
appear not as drastic as in other industry, it is clear the impacts have
been much more harshly felt.
Among the operating changes, some are rather benign (new hygiene
protocols and practices or some physical distancing) but others include
changes to workforce arrangements, such as fewer hours or working from
home.
And then there is the operating change that see the business not
actually operating. Nearly one in five of all businesses in the arts and
recreation industry are no longer trading.
The data is released at a point when once again the government has indicated that a stimulus package for that industry is coming.
This is something that has been long promised and long put off. Now the
industry will likely have to wait until the budget update on 23 July.
The impact of the Covid-19 restrictions is such that nearly half of
all businesses in Australia have seen their revenue fall by at least 50%
compared with this time last year:
Rather
shockingly, 10% of all businesses (excluding those that are unable to
determine) have seen their revenue drop by more than 75%.
And the most obvious industry to see such economic carnage is again
the arts and recreation sector – a third of all businesses in that
industry have seen their revenue fall by catastrophic levels: By contrast, more than a fifth of all businesses in the retail trade
sector have seen their revenue increase compared with this time last
year.
Clearly this is due to the massive panic buying that occurred
in the early months and also the strong recovery off the back of the
easing of restrictions.
But the retail sector is hardly representative, and is in such a
state of flux that it is far too early to say what the
medium-to-long-term impacts will be.
Last
week the ABS’s preliminary retail trade data showed there had been a
16.3% increase of trade in May coming off the back of a 17.7% fall in
April and an 8.5% rise in March: What the figures will look like for this current month, let alone the rest of the year, is anyone’s guess.
While people might be turning towards retail as an outlet for the
recreational spending, what they will not be doing any time soon is
spending it in the arts and recreation sector.
Productions
remain suspended or cancelled, and while there are some cinemas open
around the country, there is very little to show.
All the latest major Hollywood releases remain on hold, and last weekend the biggest film in the Australian box office was The Invisible Man, which took in just $49,569 – some $5m less than when it was the number one film back in February.
And the arts and recreation sector will continue to be the industry to suffer the most in the coming months.
Even once trading and travel restrictions lessen, social-distancing
measures will likely be in place indefinitely (or perhaps until a
vaccine is found).
The arts and recreation industry is the one set to be the most affected by these ongoing restrictions.
Some 68% of businesses in that sector say they will be impacted to “a
great extent” by social distancing – well beyond even the 50% of
businesses in the accommodation and food services industry that say they
will be affected: It goes with the latest jobs data that shows while the accommodation
and food services industry looks to have bottomed out, the arts and
recreation sector remains as barren for work as it has been throughout
the entire crisis.
The treasurer on Wednesday
suggested the government had “been working on a set of measures and
supports for that sector, recognising that the social-distancing
requirements that are in place have made it very hard for those events
in that sector to continue as they did pre-Covid”.
Given it is now more than three months since the virus began to
slaughter the economy and destroy the arts industry, one wonders why it
took them so long.
This package will be very welcome, but while it is probably somewhat
too little, it is clear for all to see that for most businesses and arts
workers it is far, far too late. • Greg Jericho writes on economics for Guardian Australia
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