Gillard: “Uni Melb Doing Its Best”
Posted by savevca1 on January 23rd, 2010
Education Minister Julia Gillard has curiously defended the University of Melbourne’s handling of the Victorian College of the Arts in an interview with Jon Faine on ABC 774 saying “I think the University of Melbourne is doing its best to manage the VCA becoming part of what the university does.”
Gillard went on to deflect any suggestion VCA could be moved to the Arts Ministry and become autonomous (like Sydney’s National Institute of Dramatic Art).
Clearly the University’s “best” is far from good enough, and it is worrying our Education Minister considers the University’s performance anywhere near acceptable.
Unfortuantely Gillard’s response is in line with a long history of inaction and buck-passing by both the Federal and State Governments, coloured by personal relationships with University management:
- Federal Arts Minister – Julia Gillard: “The VCA is an important institution. We are prepared to work collaboratively with the State Government, with the VCA itself, with the University of Melbourne, on its future.” (Julia Gillard on ABC TV Stateline 28/08/09).
- Federal Arts Minister – Peter Garrett: “It’s [VCA] not something that is specifically funded through me and I don’t anticipate it being something that I’ll be funding.” (Peter Garrett on ABC Radio National 04/10/09).
- Victorian Premier – John Brumby: “Mr Brumby knocked back the cash plea, saying VCA funding was a matter for the Commonwealth and it was the Howard government that had decided not to fund the college as an independent arts institution”. (The Age 27/08/09)
- Former Victorian Arts Minister – Lynne Kosky: “State Governments have never funded tertiary institutions. That is rightly the responsibility of the Federal Government in terms of the operating funding.” (Lynne Kosky on ABC TV Stateline 28/08/09).
So we have the Victorian Government saying it’s a Federal problem (even though it was the Victorian Government that merged VCA and Uni Melb and enacted the Heads of Agreement that was supposed to protect VCA). And we have a Federal Government who refuse to buy into the debate at all (which is no doubt coloured by Uni of Melb Vice Chancellor Glyn Davis being a close friend of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd).
What do we do? Use the Discussion Paper submission template which includes a demand that VCA become Arts Ministry funded at the levels comparable to NIDA. This would also make VCA independent. We must flood the VCA Review Committee with the view that unlike Julia Gillard, we believe the University of Melbourne deserve a damming report card and VCA must be taken off their hands. Submissions close 12/02/10.
Full Transcript of ABC 774 Interview 22/01/10
JON FAINE: 17 minutes to 10. Julia Gillard’s offered to take some calls and I better get to them otherwise I’ll keep banging on and I won’t have any time for your calls.
Jordy from Southbank is first up. Good morning, Jordy.
JORDY: Good morning. I’m putting a question to the Deputy Prime Minster – why won’t the Federal Government step in and save Australia’s premier practical arts college, the Victorian College of the Arts?
JULIA GILLARD: The Victorian College of the Arts as you know is part of Melbourne University. We do fund the Victorian College of the Arts through our support for the student places in the Victorian College of the Arts. I know that there is a review in progress that was initiated by the state government about funding and models for the college. So we are supporting the college as through supporting the student places.
CALLER 1: Well Julia, it would be great if the Victorian College of the Arts was funded federally like NIDA is. NIDA does support drama and production sides, but the Victorian College of the Arts actually does all spectrums of the art world, we’ve got art, film and television, music, production, dance and drama. So you know it has six schools within it and Melbourne University, who is obviously not focussed on practical education due to the Melbourne model, has stepped in and there’s a threat here for Australia’s arts culture, that we’re going to lose things like puppetry which we lost this year, music theatre which we lost this year. It really is, for a person like me who is a developing artist in this world, it’s an absolute shame that Australia is not investing money in the Arts like we’re investing in sport and that sort of thing, Its really, I’m really desperately, I’m extremely upset by the closure of the college and I think the only way to save…
JON FAINE: Hold on the college hasn’t closed, Jordy.
CALLER 1: Well, the signs gone out the front, Jon, it’s now the Southbank Campus for the University of Melbourne.
JON FAINE: Some courses have been discontinued but I don’t want you to exaggerate, care as we do about the VCA. Let’s find out how much Julia Gillard cares about the VCA. Subject to this review, are you prepared if necessary to directly fund the VCA, if there’s no other way of keeping that standing by?
JULIA GILLARD: I admire Jordy’s passion and he obviously is passionate about the VCA and that’s fantastic. Jon, I’m not coming here to make a funding commitment and I’m not going to do so. We support the VCA through supporting student places. It hasn’t been direct funded out of the Arts portfolio the way some other places ar
JON FAINE: WAAPA in Perth is, NIDA in Sydney is. VCA’s been an anomaly, and suddenly it’s vulnerable.
JULIA GILLARD: We are continuing to support the student places, it’s gone into the University of Melbourne. I know Jordy’s critical of the performance of the University of Melbourne, but I think the University of Melbourne is doing its best to manage the VCA becoming part of what the university does, and we have significantly increased resources to universities through the Bradley reforms, a more then $5 billion dollar package in the last Budget.
JON FAINE: You will be hearing a lot about the VCA during the course of this election year and they will undoubtedly, the activists who have been passionate, like Jordy so far, will continue to let you know.
Disappointing but no surprise. She is indicating that the federal government will not interfere because if they did, they would be asked for money, and they don’t want to do that. Canberra has ANU – the best funded university in Australia. I guess they would like the states to copy them and start supporting their own universities to the same level, but the states haven’t paid for universities since Gough Whitlam let them off the hook in the mid-1970s, so why should they now volunteer?
The victorian government can’t even run a transport system let alone realise that maintaining a world class educational institution like the VCA would be a good idea. The VCA has been brought to the current crisis by by good old Brendan Nelson cutting their funding. The buck keeps getting passed on and no-one takes responsibility. Brumby where are you (again?)…
Short note in terms of states giving funding. The Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts (part of Edith Cowan University) receives both State and Federal funding. The National Institute of Dramatic Art is funded via the Arts Ministry (as opposed to the Education Ministry like VCA and WAAPA) and thus it is funded at higher levels and operates autonomously (i.e it is not part of a larger University). The optimum financial outcome for VCA would be being funded like NIDA through the Arts Ministry at the same levels of NIDA – financial security and independence in one go.
The difference between arts and education ministry funding is stark. For instance, in 2008, the federal funding of the Teaching Program at NIDA was $17,510 per student (p 46, NIDA Annual Report 07/08) and the federal funding of the Teaching Program at VCAM was $9,560 (presentation by the Vice Chancellor, 25 August 2009).