Music ranked third in Federal Government’s arts spend

A new Department of Communication and the Arts report released this week showed that music was the third highest in the Federal Government’s arts spending in 2015—16.

This was according to the report Cultural Funding By Government 2015–16 prepared by a consultant from the Australian Bureau of Statistics on behalf of the Meeting of Cultural Ministers.

During this period, the Federal Government spent a total of $2.3 billion on cultural activities.

Of that, $1.8 billion (or 79%) went on arts activities and $474.5 million for heritage activities.

Of the five arts categories, the biggest expenditure was on radio and television services at $1.347.2 million, with film and video production and distribution coming in second at $88.2 million.

Music was third, with $71.3 million.

These three categories made up 83% of all the Government’s arts expenditure.

Behind them came arts education ($48.0 million) and visual arts and crafts ($40.3 million).

If you factor in cultural spending by other tiers of government, the totalspend rises to $5.8 billon.

In that perspective, $2.3 billion from the Federal Government made 39.2% of the spend, $1.2 billion from state and territory governments (33.8%) and over $1.5 billion (27%) from local governments.

The Federal Government’s arts spend averaged $75.86 per person. For state and territory governments it was $30.47 per person, and $65.92 per person by local government.

Breaking it down by states and territories, the larger ones had a higher spend. However, on a per person basis, the smaller ones had a relatively higher levels of expenditure.

The Northern Territory lead with $208.82 per person, followed by the ACT ($161.07), and Tasmania ($147.29).

The lower per person expenditure was in NSW ($76.63), Victoria ($73.32) and Queensland ($63.89).

In terms of its spend on music, NSW had $12.4 million, Victoria $8.8 million, South Australia $8.7 million, Queensland $6.5 million, Northern Territory $1.5 million and the ACT $1.2 million.

No figures were provided for music spend for WA and Tasmania.

Read the full report on the Department of Communication and the Arts website.