TRANSCRIPT - SPEECH - PARLIAMENTARY FRIENDS OF LIVE PERFORMANCE - TUESDAY, 23 JUNE 2026

E&OE TRANSCRIPT

SPEECH, PARLIAMENTARY FRIENDS OF LIVE PERFORMANCE

PARLIAMENT HOUSE, CANBERRA

TUESDAY, 23 JUNE 2026

MINISTER FOR THE ARTS, TONY BURKE: Every art form is important. Live performance does something that no other art form can. In live performance; the performer feels you, hears you, knows you and reacts to you.

There is a role and a real presence for an audience and for people who consume art live that doesn't match anything else and it's getting harder. As part of consultation with cultural policy, this is one of the things which we have to make sure doesn't just survive but thrives. It's really important.

I wasn't going to mention this, but given that Bell Shakespeare spoke. Their theatre in Sydney is called The Nutshell, based on that line from Shakespeare: “I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space”. That concept that within the theatre, on that stage, there is infinite space as big as the imagination and this matters.

At a time where empathy is getting harder across the world, with how people are receiving information, live performance gives empathy like nothing else, because it is a person or the people you are with. At a time where people doubt what they can see on their screens, phones and TVs, you don't doubt the reality of a performer performing for you in that moment. There is something real and tangible that we must not lose.

What live performers do is not just incredibly special, but essential. This matters, and when we talk of all the jobs, that's all true. But don't forget with the cancellation of Beetlejuice, we lose Eddie Perfect as an Australian creator, but also we don't just lose all those work opportunities, we lose the precious nature of the experience of every person who would have gone.

That moment that you talk about for ages, that rollercoaster that you ride, that joy that you feel, the way your emotions will go back and forth depending on what the performers have decided will happen and they will react with you in that moment.

We're here to celebrate something precious. It rarely has come to government to say we need your help, but live performance is there saying that right now, and I'm so glad we've got so many Members of Parliament here, because the decisions we make about live performance determine so much of the empathy and the imagination of every privileged audience member. Thanks.

ENDS