Canberra's national museums and galleries are at risk without a funding boost after years of government neglect, the Greens have warned as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese admits the cultural institutions have been starved of cash.
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Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young on Wednesday said the federal government should announce a funding increase for the institutions when it releases its highly anticipated policy for the nation's arts and cultural sector later this month, rather than wait until handing down the budget in May as signalled by Arts Minister Tony Burke.
"I am seriously concerned that unless there is sustainable funding put in place and a commitment for ongoing funding that some of these institutions just won't be able to survive in the long term. And that would be a travesty," Senator Hanson-Young said.
"They are significant for making sure we have a variety and a diversity of stories told, that history is both recorded and challenged, and that those who are the storytellers are given due respect and admiration, something that has been lacking for a number of years from the previous government."
The Greens senator said complacency and disinterest from the former Coalition government had undermined national cultural institutions, and that a lack of funding had stopped them taking on additional exhibitions and had affected their education programs.
"The decade of funding cuts to the cultural institutions has just left them bare-boned really, and we're at a crunch point now," she said.
Mr Albanese on Wednesday signalled the government was considering funding for the cash-strapped museums and galleries in the next federal budget, when asked about them in a radio interview.
"We will deal with this as part of our budget processes. But you're quite right, that the national institutions have been starved of funds," he told ABC radio.
"These are national assets that are a very important part about our fabric. And so, that is something that the government will give consideration to in the lead-up to the May budget."
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Senator Hanson-Young welcomed the Prime Minister talking about the issue, but said she was frustrated the government had not already committed to funding increases and that it should do this when Mr Burke releases the new cultural policy on January 30.
"Unless there is money on the table, the words of the minister will ring hollow," Senator Hanson-Young said.
She also called for the government to scrap the efficiency dividend, an annual funding cut for galleries and museums that started under the Hawke government and that has forced institutions to make cuts in programming, exhibitions and staffing numbers.
National cultural institutions have sounded the alarm about their funding levels, telling the Albanese government they were at an impasse after a decade of under-funding and staffing cuts, and urging it to restore their resources to stop them being left behind.
The National Gallery of Australia in December warned it might have to shut two days a week and reintroduce entry fees as it faces a $265 million funding shortfall over the next decade, while later that month it emerged that the National Library of Australia's online database, Trove, might disappear without new funding to keep it running beyond June 2023.
Mr Burke that month said the government was preparing to take major decisions to deal with the problems facing national institutions, but that these wouldn't form part of the Albanese government's national cultural policy.
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