ADAM STEER, HOST: There's a bit going on in Darwin this morning. The Federal Government announced a new arts policy with some big ideas to hopefully inject our creative industries – who of course have suffered enormously over the last couple of years during COVID. The Revive program will establish a funding body called Creative Australia, which will house the first Nations agency, Music Australia, Writers Australia, as well as a workplace safety body. Luke Gosling is the federal Member for the Darwin seat of Solomon and he's in his bag of fruit today. You've got a special engagement to go to in just a moment. Mr. Gosling, What is it?
LUKE GOSLING, MEMBER FOR SOLOMON: Oh, it's heading to the swearing in of Hugh Heggie as our new administrator. The Governor-General is in town and so we need to be in the Parliament shortly. But I wanted to come and have a chat because Music Australia's going to be massive for the Territory and over $80 million for that. There’s also going to be a First Nations board within Creative Australia. There's more funding in there for the creative arts, but also I think Tony Burke, as most listeners would know, he's a musician himself and he is really passionate about not only the Territory and getting up here as soon as he can, but he knows how important the arts are in our economy. So that's what Creative Australia is going to drive.
STEER: I was having a look at some reactions to this policy announcement from a number of experts across the industry. Reasonably widely applauded, of course, because it is an injection of a large amount of money. There are some questions around some of the policies in there, but $286 million, a cultural policy for the arts and entertainment sector over the next four years. What does the government hope to achieve by this policy?
GOSLING: One of the things that's great for the Territory is there's heaps of jobs in the music industry and across creative arts. But it'd be fair to say that even though we've got some high profile First Nations artists, we haven't got the sound engineers, we haven't got people throughout the jobs that are available. So particularly at a time when people are talking about jobs for Indigenous people in the Northern Territory or around Australia, it's going to help with those workforce training issues, supporting people into those jobs. That's going to be great for the Territory, but it's also going to help people export our creative arts overseas, so more of Australia gets it. I was recently in New York and visited Mitch Fifield, who's the Australian ambassador to the UN, and he's got the most incredible Territory First Nations arts on his walls that's owned by Steve Martin, the comedian. He's got one of the biggest private collections in the world. People like Steve Martin, who know about First Nations art, but it and pay a lot of money for it. Creative Australia is going to help us to get Territory product out there into the world.
STEER: $70 million per year across the entire arts sector. So that's performing arts, visual arts, creative arts, screen television. That's a lot of fingers in a relatively small pie.
GOSLING: Yeah, we're going to grow the pie too, because we're going to force the streamers like Netflix to use a big percentage, relatively big percentage – up to 20 per cent of the revenue that they get from us, from Australians who watch their stuff, and that is to go back into Australian content. So that'll be up to half a billion dollars injected into our into our industry.
STEER: I mean that's going to be a challenge, right, because the Australian content rules were designed when we all had three channels on our tiny little black and white television, basically, before the Internet, before streaming. You've got Netflix, a streaming-only platform does produce some Aussie content at the moment. Then you've got other streaming services like Stan, which are connected to a free-to-air channel. So they'll argue they already do Aussie content. And then you've got places like Paramount Plus which only stream from overseas.
GOSLING: They're difficult conversations. But yeah, we've got a timetable there to have those conversations. We’re not throwing it on them overnight, but we're giving them the opportunity to commission more NT content. And we've had some great stuff on Netflix, but also to bring in some more content. And it'll be good for them because people overseas will love seeing a bit of Australia as well.
STEER: Yeah, bigger conversation there. It is ten past nine, I do need to let you go quite soon. The visiting head of the United States Marine Corps, Commandant General David Berger, is warning that Australia and his country will need everything in the cupboard to avoid a conflict with China. Did you meet with the Commandant while he was here in Darwin this week?
GOSLING: Yeah, a couple of weeks ago I met with him in the Pentagon in Washington DC and then it was great to catch up with him here with Natasha Fyles, the Chief Minister. Which as you said, Adam, when I talked to you, I couldn't tell you the date he was coming, but it was a great conversation. He was mainly here to listen, just to see how the Marines have been going here, if we've got any suggestions. Of course we made the point about it would be great if they used more local businesses as part of their supply chains. But he was here on a listening tour. He then went down to Canberra, had some conversations down there about the future. But the first thing he said is “including diplomatic means”. Of course, he’s representing the US Marines, an arm of hard power for the United States in the same way as our ADF is. But well before that he talked about everything in the cabinet to avoid war in the Indo-Pacific, and that's what everyone wants. But we also need to be realistic, pragmatic, and our responsibility, particularly as the federal government, is to make sure that we are interoperable enough so that we can work together if need be.
STEER: His colleague, the US Air Mobility Commander Mike Minihan, warned this week that America could go to war with China by 2025. This is due to China emboldened enough if they're bold enough to invade Taiwan. Are their plans for military expansion in Darwin because of this threat? Do you know about that?
GOSLING: Not because of any threat, but it is true and the Defence Minister and the Prime Minister have been very clear about what Australians intuitively feel is that, you know, the geostrategic circumstances in our neighbourhood are probably the most tense they have been since the Second World War. Particularly for us here in Darwin, we have a responsibility to the nation to provide an operational base for the ADF and for allies and partners should there be a threat to our sovereignty in the region. But I would think, just coming back from Washington DC, that that senator’s thoughts aren’t shared across the board. Of course Xi Jinping the Chinese leader and his Chinese Communist Party have full control over what they decide to do about Taiwan, and that would present a very difficult situation for us. But that's what international diplomacy, multilateral action and deterrence is all about. And Australia needs to make sure that we've got the ability to deter anyone from threatening our sovereignty. But also, we need to be able to deter changes to the status quo.
STEER: Luke Gosling, good to see you this morning. I'll let you go so you can get to Parliament House in 90 seconds.
GOSLING: Thanks Adam, cheers.
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