The Australia Council’s Noise festival: A Crikey investigation

The Australian Government’s youth media festival “Noise” has not filed ASIC returns since 2002 despite receiving more than $4.8 million in Commonwealth funding in that time, an investigation by Crikey has revealed.

The Noise festival is an online youth media initiative of the Australia Council and represents one of the Council’s largest items of expenditure in the youth arts sector. The festival has an international reputation and enjoys a high profile due to its many media partnerships and content tie-ins.

But as Crikey has discovered, the governance arrangements for Noise are far from transparent. Unlike the vast majority of arts organisations, Noise is not funded through a competitive grants process, and the Australia Council does not advertise or tender for the production of the noise initiative.

Although the Noise website states that Noise is a “not-for-profit initiative,” Noise is not listed by the Australian Tax Office’s Register of Cultural Organisations – the master list of Australian cultural charities. In fact, Noise is a for-profit company called Reamont Pty Ltd of which Noise’s Executive Producer Brandon Saul is the sole director and shareholder.

The Australia Council’s governance arrangements with noise have previously been the subject of Parliamentary scrutiny. In 2002, then ALP arts spokeswoman Senator Kate Lundy asked a number of questions of the Australia Council in Senate estimates about the Noise relationship. In particular, she asked why Noise supremo Brandan Saul was re-appointed as Executive Producer of the festival without competitive tender. The Australia Council replied:

In accordance with provisions contained in the Council’s guidelines concerning the appointment of consultants, Brandon Saul, operating as Reamont Pty Ltd, was appointed Executive Producer of Noise (2003) without the Council undertaking a tendering process. This appointment was made on the basis that Mr Saul was appointed Executive Producer of LOUD (1998) and Noise (2001).

Crikey spoke to the Australia Council and Brandon Saul in an attempt to unpick the relationship. Saul claims there is nothing amiss.

“I’m simply a contractor managing the implementation of Noise,” he wrote in an email, adding that Reamont Pty Ltd is “simply the service entity used to effect the day to day activities of the initiative.”

Saul argues the arrangement is “entirely commonplace.”

Brandon Saul also receives financial bonuses for sponsorship outcomes at Noise, which he defends.

“I receive a very small bonus if I bring sponsorship in for the initiative – this is commonplace for people in my position.”

But the Australia Council’s arrangement with noise is far from commonplace, even in the arts. Nearly all the organisations funded by the Australia Council have to compete against each other in a highly competitive peer assessment process. Further, most are non-profit cultural organisations with separate board and management, published annual reports and significant levels of transparency. Noise’s annual reports are not published on the organisation’s website and according to the ASIC website, has not lodged an annual return since 2002. Nor are the bonuses paid to Saul for bringing in sponsorship – which have obvious potential to generate conflicts of interest – publicly declared. Saul maintains that Reamont does in fact lodge returns with ASIC.

Noise is also not the only activity Reamont Pty Ltd undertakes. For the past four years it has managed the Australia Council’s Australian Music Online project a “web-based initiative that aimed to advance the marketing and promotion of new Australian contemporary music.” Reamont also controversially received $1.4 million in funding through the Department of Prime Minster and Cabinet’s Partnerships Against Domestic Violence initiative, a decision which drew criticism in this Sydney Morning Herald article by Anne Summers.

The funding was for noise’s “Making Noise” initiative “to undertake a number of media based and online projects to gain an understanding of sexual assault issues for young women and men.”

Again, this funding was a so-called “direct engagement” which was not publicly tendered.

The Australia Council’s Director of Market Development Sandra Bender, who has had a distinguished career at the Canadian Council for the Arts, defends noise as internationally respected and influential, and told Crikey that an “extraordinary” amount of detail is required for noise’s budget submissions.

When Crikey contacted Minster Peter Garrett’s office through the Department of Environment, Water, Heritage and the Arts, we were informed that “the Australia Council operates at arms length from government through a process of peer assessment in considering applications for funding” and that “this is also the case in relation to the Australia Council’s management of the ‘Noise’ program – the Council has the full day to day responsibility for managing this government initiative.” But as Crikey has discovered, Noise is not peer assessed and the day-to-day operations of Noise are outsourced to Reamont.

Noise has proved itself to be a survivor during the convulsive recent history of the Australia Council – unlike other aspects of the Australia Council’s youth arts engagement such as The Program or the Council’s entire Community Cultural Development Board. As one of the largest single items of federal youth arts funding, the Noise initiative continues to enjoy levels of funding that the rest of the youth arts sector can only envy.

Given this funding, is it too much to ask that the initiative be publicly tendered and peer assessed, and that Noise’s annual report be publicly available? After all, there is one aspect of noise that no-one disputes: the young artists who contribute to noise don’t get paid.

Commonwealth funding to Reamont Pty Ltd since 2002:
Source: Australia Council Annual Reports, Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet