Ms Sin?ad O'Reilly:

I will add a point on emerging artists, because the Senator mentioned them in particular. Arts Council awards are not just for the professional, to be clear. They are for artists at all career stages. In particular, our agility award supports artists who are emerging or who may not have applied for funding before. It is a very light-touch and accessible scheme.

The other element of support for artists who are entering into the system of public supports is that there are capacity-building initiatives and professional development initiatives. We fund a number of arts resource organisations which provide some professional development for artists in terms of filling out applications and different career-progressing opportunities they may need.

To circle back to local authorities and local government, because they come up again, something local authorities are doing a lot of is supporting emerging artists on the ground to be able to access funding from either the local authority itself or from the Arts Council or other sources.