Prominent arts lobbyists have been making great efforts to paint the picture of a Conservative government having 'gutted the arts'. Many sing from the same plaintive song-sheet suggesting that the Canadian artistic community is suffering and starved for funds. Like many interest groups seeking more money, they play the same broken record trying to evoke images of starving artists and a heartless government. The facts, however, paint a different picture.
Arts spending has grown importantly during Mr. Harper's term as Prime Minister. As well, international comparisons reveal Canada is a leader in arts spending. This spending raises a broader question as to what is the most effective method for government to support the arts - more direct government subsidies or a tax system that supports personal choice and higher charitable giving.
The Harper government has commendably announced a handful of reductions to some funding programs. They include:
$13.7 million for the PromArt and Trade Routes programs which promoted and supported Canadian artists exhibiting and performing outside of Canada, $1.5 million for Canadian Independent Film and Video, and $2.5 million for the National Training Program in the Film and Video Sector. Axing these programs ends questionable spending like taxpayers paying for British anti-war activist Gwnne Dyer to go to Cuba and for CBC activist Avi Lewis to attend a film festival in Australia. These and other rumoured reductions amount to $44 million. Yes, even with these reductions, federal spending on the arts has risen almost as fast as overall program spending.
Arts funding has grown at the federal level since 2005 by 10% while overall program spending has grown by 15%. The federal Public Accounts show that the only arts institution to see a reduction in subsidies was Telefilm Canada while all others grew, including grants to the Canada Council for the Arts increasing to $182 million from $155 million and an increase to the CBC of $86 million pushing its subsidy over the $1.1 billion mark.
The arts community when faced with such facts often trot out an appeal to comparisons with Europe and its support for the arts. Yet, here again a 2005 study by the Canada Council for the Arts, commissioned while Prima Ballerina Karen Kain was chair, reveals that per capita government funding for the arts in Canada exceeded that of France by 30% and outstripped Germany by 40%. The study showed that Canadian governments at all levels combined to spend $7.3 billion per year versus $10 billion in France and $13 billion in Germany. Of course, France and Germany have much larger populations, at the time 61 million and 82 million respectively with Canada at 33 million.
Given that arts funding in Canada has risen and not declined it is difficult to view arts lobbyists' complaints as anything more than hostile partisan attacks and another special interest group with their hand out. They join a long list of such groups and interests; cities, provinces, environmentalists, corporations, researchers, and athletes, just to name a few.
When government is involved in establishing art and culture priorities money that should go to artists is misdirected to the arts bureaucracy - arteaucrats. The federal department of Canadian Heritage alone spends approximately $1 billion a year just to run the department. Individuals, families and businesses should, instead, choose themselves whether to fund and for which organizations and events they wish to be patrons, instead of arteaucrats making those decisions for them.
To return the choice to taxpayers, government should provide broad-based tax relief for individuals, families and businesses so they have more money for discretionary spending which they may then choose to allocate as they wish; attending events or charitable giving to arts and culture.
This is the approach taken in the United States which, according to the England-based Charities Aid Foundation, has the highest rate of charitable giving in the world at 1.67% of GDP, whereas Canada ranks third with only 0.72% of GDP.
Picasso reportedly said "art is the elimination of the unnecessary". What an artist the Prime Minister would be if he worked to eliminate more and unnecessary spending. Then all Canadians would be free to enjoy the art and culture of their choosing - instead of funding arteaucrats and special interests.
