Attempts to address cost-of-living relief pressures, power bill rebates and a boost to the Commonwealth Rent Assistance program were among the headliners in Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ third federal budget speech, but the arts also managed to secure some fiscal love.

Among those to benefit from government largesse will be the Arts8 collective – Australia’s leading national training organisations in the performing arts – who will, between them, be $115.2m better off (over four years).

Of the Arts8 members, the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) will take the largest share of the promised spending, receiving $51.9m over four years. NAISDA Dance College, Australia’s premier Indigenous training college, will receive $13m; the Flying Fruit Fly Circus $7.3m and The Australian Ballet School $6.5m.

$3.7 million has been earmarked for the Australian National Academy of Music and $3 million for the Australian Youth Orchestra.

NIDA, Sydney. Photo supplied

The funding goes some way to reversing a sharp decline in government funding for arts training over the past decade, as revealed in a recently-published report commissioned from consultants KordaMentha into the sustainability of the sector. It found, for example, that government...