Much of that is quite specifically earmarked for rural and regional areas of the State. Analogies might be dangerous, but yesterday this was a fair boast. Ms Archer correctly described the proposed taxation reforms recommended by the Ralph Review of Business Taxation as unfair to emerging artists, because their equipment loss would no longer be tax-deductible, and a glaring contradiction, given that grants to elite organisations had been substantially increased. She could not forgive the Coalition for this, Ms Archer said. It would help the arts community if she did, however.
Politicians say many things in campaigns they later regret.
By being so dismissive of the increased funding to the major performing arts organisations, though, Ms Archer risks entrenching the notion that the arts community, or its prominent spokespeople, are irreconcilably opposed to any Coalition government. There is a good deal of evidence that there is a bias within the arts community towards the Labor Party. However, if this is the attitude the Coalition Government takes to the Ralph Review's recommendations that from July 1 there should be a strict distinction between business losses and lifestyle losses, it will be a pity. The distinction is supposed to kill off the hobby-farm tax lurk. And if it does, it is welcome, for it will release millions of dollars to the Australian Taxation Office that are unfairly denied to the community.