Gai Brodtmann (Canberra, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Defence) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yesterday's estimates confirmed what we already know about the Turnbull government's harsh, cruel cuts to our national institutions. The Turnbull government's cuts to our national institutions that we heard about yesterday are having a significant impact on our national story, on our national history, on our nation's voice, on our nation's music and on our nation's uniquely Australian interpretation of events, landscapes and environments. The National Gallery of Australia's director, Gerard Vaughan, told senators that 2016-17 had been a challenging year and that restructuring the gallery had been a difficult but interesting process. He also said—and this is where the rubber hits the road; this is what cuts actually mean—that tighter finances had forced the gallery to rotate its collections more slowly, from every six months to between nine and 12 months. With fewer people conserving, preserving and curating our national collection, there is greater potential that the collection will not be able to tell our national story, our national history and our language to future generations. Since the Turnbull-Abbott government came into power, it has been nothing but cuts, cuts and cuts for national institutions. We are not cutting into fat and we are not cutting into bone; we are cutting into vital organs.