Arts, Culture and Heritage Policy

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Introduction

Art - it all its many forms - inspires, innovates, challenges, and contributes to our collective social, economic, and cultural wellbeing. We commit to foster the arts, culture and heritage at all levels.

• New Zealand has a strong creative sector. With the right support, the arts have the potential to become a significant, non-agricultural export industry for New Zealand.
• In Aotearoa New Zealand, our unique heritage includes the taonga of toi Maori and Te Reo Maori, and we support these taonga, including the retention of Maori TV and the promotion of iwi radio.
• Our heritage, especially heritage buildings and sites, have taken on even more significance since the Canterbury earthquakes. We will facilitate the preservation of our heritage sites uas much as possible.

All art forms practised and recognised in Aotearoa New Zealand are included in this policy. Between Government and the Arts sector there should be a broad relationship of support and understanding. The Green Party recognises that the Arts and Cultural Heritage have the potential to represent an environmentally friendly, strategic investment and economic development area. It is an area with growth potential and the ability to provide valuable export income. To this end, it is important that we recognise and support local talent and create the conditions in which this talent can reach the highest standard and be enjoyed by the widest audience. Creative pursuits should be encouraged in educational institutions (from early childhood to tertiary level), retirement facilities, correction facilities, community centres, galleries, museums, theatres, libraries, marae, hospitals and historic sites or buildings as well as urban and rural communities. To achieve this it is vital that these areas are provided with adequate resources and trained professionals to encourage widespread participation.

Vision

The Green Party envisions an Aotearoa New Zealand where arts and arts practitioners are supported and valued and society recognises the worthwhile contribution that they make to our social, cultural and economic wellbeing. Creative and cultural and heritage work is recognised as being a useful means of empowering people, encouraging intercultural appreciation and understanding and helping to develop additional skills, training, and confidence. The unique contribution of toi o Māori and taonga Māori to the identity of Aotearoa New Zealand is recognised, respected and valued.

Key Principles

1. Society should facilitate widespread participation in and affordable access to the Arts and Cultural Heritage.
2. Public funding of the Arts and Cultural Heritage (including heritage resourcing and development) must be transparent and sustainable.
3. Those involved in delivery and development of the Arts and Cultural Heritage must be involved and have a say in development of guidelines for funding.
4. Local communities must be given the ability to protect places and buildings and heritage collections that are important to them historically and culturally.
5. Society should appreciate the unique taonga of toi o Māori and the contribution it makes to the identity of Aotearoa New Zealand.
6. The Crown has a responsibility to ensure the protection of taonga, including Māori Arts and culture and must support and contribute to the revitalisation of toi Māori, tikanga Māori and te reo Māori.

Specific Policy Points

1. Communication and Co-ordination

The Green Party will:

1. Promote improved communication and co-ordination between government ministries, funding agencies, local bodies, tangata whenua, community and other stakeholders involved in arts, culture and heritage. This will involve:
   1. All government ministries that currently have an interest in the delivery of programmes in or through the arts and cultural heritage such as the Ministry of Arts, Culture and Heritage, Maori Development: Te Puni Kokiri, Broadcasting, and Education, Department of Conservation.
   2. All partially or wholly government funded agencies that currently have an interest in the delivery of programmes in or through the arts, culture or heritage shall be included, such as schools, polytechnics and universities, the Aotearoa New Zealand Film Commission, Te Papa, libraries, galleries, museums.
   3. All established non-governmental and community organisations involved in Arts, Culture and Heritage that receive government funding and which currently have an interest in the delivery of programmes in or through the arts, such as: Arts Subject Associations, the New Zealand Writers' Guild, Women in Film and Television, the New Zealand Film Council, the NZ Symphony Orchestra and other historically important arts.

The Green Party aims to ensure:

1. Greater co-operation between Creative Aotearoa New Zealand, the Ministry of Education, the Aotearoa New Zealand Film Commission and Aotearoa New Zealand On Air.
2. Greater co-operation between the Historic Places Trust, the Ministry of Culture and Heritage, the Department of Conservation and the Ministry of Education.
3. Greater communication to effect positive social and economic growth in the creative sector.
4. An overhaul of the arts and cultural heritage infrastructure and funding provisions with a focus on increasing participation in community arts, arts and cultural heritage education and the professional arts. In particular we will support:
   1. Improved local funding of arts amenities such as community galleries where possible.
   2. Establishment of local arts trusts comprised of a consortium of established professional or semi professional arts groups with a commitment to arts education.
   3. Funding of arts organisations with a proven commitment to arts education to engage in strategic planning and business case planning.
   4. Contestable funding for arts and cultural heritage organisations with a proven commitment to arts education to enable the establishment of secretariats and premises.

2. Tangata Whenua and the Arts

Recognising the unique nature of tangata whenua and the Treaty obligations of the Crown, the Green Party strongly supports the continued promotion of Toi Māori, te reo and tikanga.The Green Party will:

1. Support and promote the right of Māori to protect both traditional and contemporary Māori art and art forms via customary rights and Te Tiriti o Waitangi. This is especially important in a context where Maori images can currently be commodified by non-Māori without acknowledgement of them as Māori intellectual property.
2. Remain committed to a dedicated Māori Television broadcasting service to play a major role in revitalising language and culture that is the birthright of every Māori and the heritage of every Aotearoa New Zealander.
3. Support Māori Television to be an independent, secure and successful Māori broadcaster.
4. Support Iwi Radio throughout Aotearoa New Zealand to be an independent, secure and successful Māori broadcaster.
5. Facilitate appropriate processes for Māori artists and arts practitioners when interfacing with government funding agencies, ministries and their agents.

3. Media and the Arts

The Green Party recognises the importance of providing opportunities and platforms to nurture our own talent and creativity as a nation, reflecting the unique cultural environment of Aotearoa New Zealand. We aim to support and promote this uniqueness to position the Aotearoa New Zealand producers of music, television, film and alternative/new media as world-class practitioners and providers for the domestic and international market. The Green Party will:

1. Support strategies to ensure the production of quality Aotearoa New Zealand music, films and programmes by Aotearoa New Zealand composers, producers, directors and writers through innovative incentive programmes, Creative New Zealand, the New Zealand Film Commission and NZ on Air
2. Review the Government's approach to incentivising film production in New Zealand to ensure that locally written and produced smaller budget films are not disadvantaged
3. The Green Party supports measures to provide independent and dependent contractors (including contractors in the film industry) with access to a dispute resolution process, the ability to bargain collectively, and legislation for minimum pay and conditions

For detailed policy on broadcasting, see the Green Party's Broadcasting Policy.

4. Education, Community and the Arts

Recognising that our future artists and practitioners receive their introduction to, and much training in the arts at a community level, as well as recognition that schools are training our future arts practitioners, we need to nurture and encourage the development of the arts at this level.The Green Party will:

1. Recognise the value of community arts and community arts organisations through continued Creative Communities funding and national and local government support.
2. Recognise that expression through the arts is vital to community expression and well-being, and develop mechanisms to support, promote and protect the arts of Pacific and new migrant communities.
3. Recognise the value of arts in our educational institutions through the development and implementation of an ongoing arts education strategy from early childhood to tertiary level.
4. Provide funding for Arts Education officers (from the Ministry of Education) to support the Arts Education strategy and ensure it's accessibility and implementation.
5. Provide secure funding for advisory services to schools in the performing arts, culture and screen arts.
6. Ensure young people have access to appropriate arts training, both within and external to school. Teachers, education providers and artists should have access to training to teach Arts to young people and encourage young artists.
7. Encourage participation in the arts and crafts, culture, heritage, screen arts and broadcasting by increasing of availability and access, with particular reference to young people and children.
8. Support the purchase of artworks for public buildings, especially hospitals and schools, and encourage the therapeutic use of the arts in hospitals and other appropriate facilities.
9. Develop a network of Art Spaces and heritage equivalents in every community, accessible to all cultures and levels of ability, including portable programmes for hospital, old people's and women's refuge communities.
10. Support public museums and art galleries to ensure public access to, and sound care and management of, heritage collections as research and design resources for education, artistic, creative and community history projects.
11. Support the purchase by public collecting institutions of nationally significant heritage objects and collections at risk of export.

5. Economic Development and the Arts

The arts have an important role to play in our economic development. We have had a significant number of international successes in arts sectors including film and television, music, visual arts and others. These activities has numerous spin-offs for local writers, artists, actors, technicians, and other local businesses. The arts industry remains one of the few non-agricultural growth industries in the New Zealand economy. The Green Party recognises that investment in the arts and crafts is a socially and commercially sound proposition and wishes to develop and secure the highest standards achievable in the arts and crafts. This means improving the status of artists and craftspeople and fostering a climate that encourages innovation and artistic development. The Green Party will:

1. Reallocate resources within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade to establish an arts and cultural promotion unit. This will, with the support of the Ministries of Culture and Heritage, Tourism, and Economic Development, work to develop international promotion and exchange programmes and include an assertive international marketing function.
2. Recognise the intrinsic value of the Arts in Aotearoa New Zealand and fund it appropriately.
3. Support funding for research and development in the Arts as a contributor to the New Zealand economy.
4. Provide incentives for non-arts based businesses to invest in arts based projects and initiatives so that the sector can move away from reliance on inappropriate and inconsistent sources of revenue, i.e. lotteries, gambling.
5. Make contributions to bona fide artist organisations tax deductible along the same lines as charity donations.
6. Support Buy NZ Made - crafts such as pottery suffered in the 80's from cheap overseas imports. Today's craft practitioners deserve support and encouragement for using local ingredients, recycling, and distributing product in sustainable ways.
7. Ensure that Work and Income staff actively inform clients about the Ministry of Social Development's Pathways to Arts and Cultural Employment (PACE) scheme so that it operates as originally intended, and is sufficiently flexible in duration to ensure participants who have genuine potential to undertake a career as an artist are not prematurely forced into other employment.
8. Ensure that copyright of a commissioned work is retained by the artist, not the commissioner.
9. Continue to support the Public Lending Right in recognition of the fact that it is one of the few sources of regular income for authors, and regularly review the Public Lending Right to ensure that it provides adequate compensation to authors for the free public access New Zealanders have to their works through public libraries.
10. Establish a Literature Commission to undertake research among writers in various genres, act as a champion for New Zealand writing and writers, examine issues such as copyright and digital rights as they affect writers, and examine ways of raising remuneration for writers.

6. Protecting and Preserving our Heritage

The preservation of heritage buildings and historic sites and heritage collections is intrinsic to the development of a sustainable and unique New Zealand culture. Heritage places and collections can provide a platform for an increased understanding of the development of New Zealand's unique culture amongst New Zealanders and heritage and cultural tourism can play an important part in the economic development of local communities, and building community pride and distinctive identity.The conservation and re-use of heritage buildings has many environmental advantages as well; as it conserves the energy used in their contruction, reduces the amount of waste to landfill and reduces the need for new materials to be created/taken from the ground.The Green Party will:

1. Support the creation of a National Policy Statement for heritage under the Resource Management Act, requiring local authorities to place more weight on recognising and supporting heritage places in district plans.
2. Support central and local government funding schemes for owners of heritage buildings, to recognize that these owners are in effect custodians of a resource that is valuable to the whole community, but are expected to fund their upkeep themselves
3. Establish a well resourced national funding scheme for the earthquake strengthening of heritage buildings so that owners are not forced to pull down buildings because of the cost of compliance with the Building Act
4. Investigate funding support for small tourism ventures, including Māori businesses, which wish to use the promotion of the heritage and culture of New Zealand as a basis.
5. Improve Te Papa's National Services ability to provide effective assistance, training and other services to local museums and art galleries in the care and management of heritage collections.