It may be a dull read, but the ALP's new arts policy discussion paper is the most forward-looking arts policy to emerge from either side of politics since Paul Keating's 'Creative Nation', writes Ben Eltham. PLUS Eltham's musings on the early resignation of Australia Council CEO Jennifer Bott

Ben Eltham calls for an urgent rebalance of our cultural investment away from big organizations and towards the creative human capital of our sector. At present individual artists receive 6.3% of Australia Council grant funding, with the rest going to arts organizations. According to Eltham, this imbalance explains the strikingly low average wage for individual artists and the brain drain that results

If we stop seeing creativity as a burden on the public purse and begin to see it as leading innovation in post-industrial growth, writes Stuart Cunningham, then we could build a creative economy that is independent, self sustainable and profitably our own