Who said I was bored Hasbeen? I am rarely bored becasue I have initiative and get on with many things outside my working life which, conversely, can be boring. I think your ideas about public funding are antiquated. Even with subsidies, I don't think you realise what it currently costs, for example, simply to hire an oval or another sort of facility, and what this means for people who may not may not have a great deal of money.

What you are actually saying is that becasue they are poor they can't have access to a cricket club, football club etc. It is not cheap and I can tell you from personal experience that I struggled to find enough money to pay my fees, even with a discount, in the 90's when I was much less well-off than I am now.

The pay your own way idea only works if the money evenly distributed - it is not.

David f - I am heartened by the legal challenge you pointed out. I feel that if people want to opt out of the state system, then they should pay the full cost and not be subsidised by the state. There should be no need to go private if the state schools are properly funded including using the money currently going to private school.

I am aware that this may sound contrary to my other opinions...but hey - that's life. I believe that the state should play a role in improving people's lives, particularly those who have not the money to afford to attend sports, arts, private schools etc.

That's all right Squeers, I'm not all that taken with it myself, when one of the neighbour's kid rides his trail around a nearby paddock all day. I don't mind you hating motor racing, that's why I don't believe you should have to subsidise it. I am also a sailor, & a show jumper, & I can't see any reason why anyone should subsidise them either.

However motor racing is much closer to popular culture today, than is Shakespeare, is why I object to being expected to subsidise the "theatre".

Rock, & rap, both of which I hate, are the modern culture. I wonder if they will be revered in 100 years. Whatever, as the kids say, why should opera be subsidised by the kids who like this modern stuff, which is not only self supporting, but government revenue positive as well.

Dear Phil,

The pay your own way works quite well. You don't have the money. You do without. It's that simple. You are not entitled to circuses.

I think every child is entitled to a good education. A good education takes into account the capacity of the child.

We make choices in life, and we have to live with those choices. We just got a call from a friend whose daughter has run up $25,000 in debt and wants mommy to bail her out. Mommy has bailed her out in the past, but I hope she won't this time.

Just in passing Phil, I have some idea of costs, & effort. I am secretary of our Horse & pony club, & treasure of our sports association.

The sports association maintain the soccer fields, the cricket pitch, & the little athletics tracks as well. All of these facilities operate on the same fields donated to the council 80 years ago by a local farmer. The horse club use an adjacent field, which they maintain themselves. We share storage, & meeting sheds. We also have a netball, & a basketball court on the grounds.

Funny, the other sports don't like the free fertiliser the horses provide if they use the sports fields.

We operate these with our own funds, with no subsidy other than a gambling fund grant to buy one of our 2 large mowers. All the work is done by us, & fees for the socker or athletics are less than half the cost of equivalent child minding.

A number of our committee members spend 10 to 15 hours a month, in season, on a mower, or pushing a line marking machine.

The largest cost for our socker mums is fuel, to get to other grounds for games.

All of us object strongly to paying subsidies support drones in their leisure activities. Most of which seem to be centralised in the larger cities for elite activities.

Apologies, davidf, for my short attention-span; I read this: "we do agree about funding for private primary and secondary education", and forgot about the context. My excuse is that I'm currently wading through nearly a hundred undergraduate exam papers. I knew too that I must have misinterpreted.
I too have a particular fondness for 19th century literature and the Russians; a taste I acquired long before university. I prefer Chekhov to Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy to both. Apart from the short stories, the most memorable passage for me (apart from the Emersonian death of Andre) was Levin naturalistically mowing hay with his Surfs in Anna Karenin. Your countrymen Melville and Twain are particular favourite of mine, in that order.
Hasbeen, you make a great deal of sense, but I wonder if you're seeing the big picture. Is it safe to leave culture to its own devices, to popular appeal. Mathew Arnold thought that would lead to anarchy.

As a CONSTITUTIONALIST my very first question is where in the constitution is it provided for the Commonwealth to legislate for art? And for that matter for Sport? If it ain’t in the constitution then there is no constitutional powers to fund it! The Commonwealth of Australia is based upon a two tier government system (internally) and that is that the States can legislate unless or until the Commonwealth has legislative powers and once it commences to legislate then the States no longer can do so. As such only one level can legislate being it to any subject matter. Hence, if the States have retained their legislative powers as to art, sports, etc, then the Commonwealth has absolutely no business getting involved in it as indeed it would be unconstitutional. And if there is no legislative power then neither can there be any funding powers! So often I come across articles where people are complaining that both levels of government are not providing sufficient funding and it underlines that they do not understand that you can only legitimately have funding of either the States (Territories) or the Commonwealth but not both! This also means that any purported committee at Commonwealth level would by unconstitutional as long as the States retain their legislative powers