Richard Boyd Barrett calls for restored income supports for artists

Thanks Chair. Eight minutes. Yeah, I'm provoked by Deputy Gannon's reference to the venue we're in and it is a very nice venue but I tell you if you were trying to do some artistic evocation of the weirdness and surreal alien character of the impact of the pandemic on Irish society you could do worse than start with an image of this place and us miles away from each other in this pretty weird environment from our point of view. But look, having said that, it's better that democracy continues to function even if in a slightly weird environment and I think it is indeed democracy in the broadest sense that has produced the additional 25 million funding for the arts and that was as a result of the agitation of the arts and cultural community making their voices heard and those voices then being expressed in a dull debate and in the COVID-19 committee. And it is a tribute to the national campaign for the arts and many of the arts workers and the crew and groups like EPIC and many others who have made their voices heard and reminded us about the value and importance of arts which we have seen more than ever during the pandemic when it is really quite unimaginable to think about what the last six months would have been like six months would have been like without the music, without the literature, without the films, without the books, without all that talent and creativity and yet at that very moment when we need arts and culture and music the most there is also an existential threat to the people who make that art, both the artists and the performers but also the crew that stand behind them And as has said already and as has said already and others, the 25 million is a start but it is not nearly enough, it is one of the 13 asks of the national campaign for the arts, it doesn't really touch all of all of those who produce all of those who produce the music, the live entertainment, the art and the culture and the key demand that unites all of them is the appeal that the income supports will continue until there is a full recovery, something for which there is no foreseeable sort of moment of recovery at the moment for music, live entertainment, the arts, the theatres, the gigs, those crew, those artists, those artists and those performers and critical to doing that is continuing in some form an income subsidy, maybe not an unemployment payment actually, what we want, these artists, these crew want to do what work they can but there will not be enough work for them to make a sustainable living and let's remember most of them were struggling to have a sustainable living even before Covid, so now more than ever, they need an income support that will give them a baseline of a dignified living income but beyond which they can also do what work they can do in the period ahead, so I really would appeal to the Minister that is the key ask and it has to materialise in the July stimulus but it is not a good start that yesterday thousands of arts workers had their payments reduced cut, really kicking people when they are down rather than supporting them when they need that support. So that is not a good start and many musicians and artists were hit in their incomes because the way in which the PUP payment was cut failed to take into account the episodic precarious nature of the employment of many of those in arts culture and entertainment and therefore they have seen their incomes cut, many of them yesterday but they have no, there is no alternative for them in terms of being able to go out and simply make work for themselves to increase that income, to improve their income status. So how are they going to pay the bills, how are they going to pay the rent, how are they going to pay the childcare, they simply don't have the money and the government has made it worse and only to have the money but without going to pay the bills, so we need it to pay the bills, how are they going to pay off. So we need those income supports to be restored and maintained until the arts, entertainment, music sectors recover as well as additional supports to that. Now I want to conclude on the reference to Irish Film Workers Association, I think this is very important, many of whom live literally around the corner on on Sheriff's Street, who came into the Roctus Committee on Arts two years ago and most of them have a blacklisted since because they raised issues about health and safety, about paying conditions, about direct employment in the film industry and because of all that many of them have not worked in the film industry since. And you see there is a big difference if you look at film and all the other areas that you're supporting in these estimates. When we give money to galleries, to museums, to theatres, people get jobs. They get actual jobs and most of those people during the period of the last six months would have been on the wage subsidy scheme. As the government said, what the government's policy was, was to give the wage subsidy scheme in order to maintain the relationship between employer and employee. So in the museums there are employees. In the theatres there are employees. But in the film industry there's no employees. There's just producers who get between the money you give to Screen Ireland $20 million and the money in Section 481 $100 million but nobody has a job. And everybody who was working in Ardmore, in Troy, in Ashford and so on, March the 12th were sacked. They weren't put on the wage subsidy scheme, they were just sacked. In the development of the guidelines to reopen the industry there was no consultation with the workers whatsoever, the frontline people in the development of those guidelines. So all the money goes to a group of producers but we don't actually have any national infrastructure as a result of it and nobody has a job. Now that needs to be examined and I would repeat the appeal that the Minister needs to meet all stakeholders and indeed insist that all stakeholders come to a stakeholder forum on film which was recommended by the All-Party Arts Committee two years ago but which certain stakeholders simply refused to attend. Now I don't think they should continue to get funding if they refuse a request by an All-Party Arts Committee to come to a stakeholder forum and to work out and solve the difficulties and disputes that exist in the Irish film industry. So I would appeal to the Minister on that front.