Annie Hoey (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I apologise for not being in the room. I have been listening from my office. I thank the representatives for their contributions. I noticed the statement made by Ms Angela Dorgan from the National Campaign for the Arts, which indicated there should be as much coverage of the arts in the media sector as there is of sports. A topic that always came up when I worked in theatre was whether recording or streaming a theatre event was the same as being in the space. There is a space for that conversation to happen. It is possible to flick through any channel to watch a game; the stadiums are full and people still attend. Where is that space for showing our arts, theatre spaces and performances in our broadcaster? I would love a conversation on the feasibility of that and whether it is something that can be done. Sometimes, nothing is ever the same as experiencing things in person, but we have managed to do so for many other things. I was struck by that.

There have been many conversations around people not being able to stay in the regions or move to cities to make their art, or they can only make it up to a certain point and they then have to leave the sector because they cannot afford it. Are Government policies around housing or strategies for development of our towns and cities cognisant of the needs of this sector? Are we still missing a beat in national policy in facilitating our language, culture and creative economy? Where are we at with streamlining the national development policies? This is somewhat outside the box but I heard so much conversation about people not being able to stay or afford to live in places. Is that because there is just no national awareness, when we make plans and strategies, that we need to facilitate the language, culture and creative economy? Are we still consistently missing a beat or just assuming that the arts will survive, as they have always done, regardless of what the national policy is? That should not be the way. We should not rely on the starving artist trope in order to make art or create. Are policies making it? Is it the fault of policies that the sector continues to struggle, or not get to where it needs to be, from a Government perspective?