Australia’s arts workers are finally being recognised by the Fair Work Commission. What changes now?

CasarsaGuru/Getty On Friday, the Fair Work Commission made a provisional decision to include the arts in the modern award system , by adding the word “arts” to its Amusement, Recreation, Events and Arts Award (AREA) 2020 award.

In the Fair Work context, “awards” are legal documents that contain details on minimum pay rates and conditions of employment (including allowances, overtime and penalty rates).

So this decision is a significant milestone for arts workers and their advocates.

What will the addition of this one word mean for arts workers and their rights? Arts work is precarious and low-paid The majority of Australians engage in the arts on a daily basis and more than 260,000 people work in the sector .

Yet, there have historically been few legislated minimum standards for professional working artists and arts workers in Australia.

Although everyone who works in Australia is covered by National Employment Standards , not everyone is covered by Fair Work awards, which build on these standards to establish stronger working conditions.

Until this recent change, arts workers had been largely excluded from Fair Work’s award coverage.

Arts work is highly precarious.

And the largely unregulated nature of the sector results in some employers illegally offering below minimum wage conditions, or using contractual arrangements to exclude workers from basic entitlements.

This can leave workers with limited opportunity for negotiation, or locked out of entitlements such as superannuation.

The push for broader recognition Arts work has frequently been shoehorned into awards not designed for the sector.

In 2022, the National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA) launched the Recognise Artists as Workers campaign, garnering significant industry support.

Not long after, the federal government launched its national cultural policy, Revive .

This was the first time since 2002 that issues of work in the sector were explicitly addressed by the federal government.