Coronavirus: musicians sing out for arts sector support

Many of the nation’s best-known musicians have called on the federal government to support the arts sector.

John Farnham is one of the signatories to the letter calling for arts support. Picture: Getty Images

Many of the nation’s best-known musicians and songwriters have added their names to an open letter calling for the federal government to support the arts sector to ensure its survival during the COVID-19 crisis, which has brought the live industry to a standstill.

Artists such as Tina Arena, John Farnham, Jessica Mauboy, Jimmy Barnes, Deborah Conway and Gotye are among more than 1000 performers and music venue owners to sign the letter, ahead of an assistance package for the ­entertainment industry that is understood to be imminent.

“The Australian music sector fell off a cliff on March 13 when government made the correct and prudent decision to shut the ­nation down,” the group writes. “Without the ability for artists to play and venues to open around the country, the industry lost billions of dollars in revenue. It is estimated the box-office loss in relation to live music alone will be half a billion dollars over six months.

“While much of the economy starts to reopen, the ongoing restrictions on large gatherings means our industry will continue to be held back from returning to work. Without immediate government intervention, the Australian music sector will be hit twice as hard as the rest of the economy and thousands of jobs will be lost within months.”

The letter frames the impact of COVID-19 as an opportunity to reimagine federal, state, territory and local government support for the music industry, and concludes with a call to action for the federal government to ­assist in five ways.

First, the industry requests that the JobKeeper program for the music and broader entertainment sector be extended beyond September, so that businesses, venues and the careers of skilled workers remain viable until the resumption of the live music trade is realistic.

As well, it calls for an expansion of JobKeeper to cover artists and workers who work gig to gig and therefore fall outside the program requirement of working 12 months with the same employer.

Writing in The Australian on Tuesday, Arts Minister Paul Fletcher rejected suggestions that the arts sector was uniquely disadvantaged through its heavy use of casual employees. “Only 3 per cent of casual workers are from the arts and recreation services sector, compared with 20 per cent from accommodation and food services,” Mr Fletcher wrote.

The open letter also calls for the establishment of a $40m “Australian music recovery fund” as part of a broader $345m live performance industry recovery package, a $70m boost to Australia Council funding across all art forms, and the introductions of rebatable tax offsets for live music and for recording Australian music.

“With Australia flattening the curve, there is a huge opportunity for the local music sector to be a boon for a recovering economy,” the letter concludes.