Budget 2022: How are we still responding to COVID with arts grants?

The New Zealand Taxpayers’ Union is almost – but not quite – lost for words over Budget 2022’s announcement of another $185 million in arts and heritage grants. 

Union spokesman Louis Houlbrooke says, “We were amazed when the Government decided it was appropriate to respond to a novel coronavirus with more than $300 million in grants for art projects. We were amazed again when they topped that up to $495 million. Now they’ve topped it up again by another $185 million, and are still calling it a COVID response!” 

“The Government boasts that this spending will ‘strengthen and complement’ the Arts and Culture COVID Recovery Programme –the same programme that saw taxpayer money allocated toward ‘indigenised hypno-soundscapes’ and interpretive dances about the impact of COVID.” 

“The $18 million specifically set aside to ‘celebrate Te Ao Maori’ seems especially indulgent – Maori face very real problems in housing and education that will not be solved with arts, crafts, and theatre.”