 The winner is selected on the basis of a completed and produced script and an outline for another work.The winner receives a full commission from the Belvoir to develop their outline into a full play.The award is named in honour of Dr Philip Parsons AM (1926-1993) who was a co-founder of the performing arts publishing company, Currency Press, and "an influential teacher and mentor to many of the students, scholars, actors, directors and playwrights who created the new wave of Australian theatre in the 1970s."