New record of state investment in Culture. With a very strong commitment to film production, heritage, the improvement of cultural infrastructure and the Prado Museum. Also maintaining the 210 million that are expected to be spent this year on the Youth Cultural Bonus -waiting to see how many young people really sign up- and the 20 million allocated to Barcelona's cultural co-capital status. That yes, without updating a good part of the subsidies that the Ministry grants to many cultural institutions throughout the country, which will mean that with the high inflation this year its contribution will be worth less.
The Ministry of Culture and Sports, headed by Miquel Iceta, reaches 1,703 million euros in the new General State Budget project, compared to 1,496 million in the current year. A “very significant, very substantial” increase, the Minister pointed out, which includes a record investment in Sports and that in Culture means that the money for film production, collected in the Cinematography Protection Fund, increases by 52, 8%, from 70 to 107 million euros. Likewise, the item for the protection of historical heritage is increased fivefold, going from 2.2 to 10.9 million. And the Prado Museum goes from 55.6 to 72.1 million, including 13.4 million euros more in investments for the rehabilitation of the Hall of Kingdoms.
Both the Reina Sofía Museum and the National Library earn two million euros in this budget project in which, as a result of the pandemic and the long hours in front of screens and books in the successive waves of covid, culture is considered From now on, the Minister has recalled, as a public good of a preferential nature, just like health and education. In this sense, Iceta assures that "these are budgets designed to strengthen cultural industries, help create new audiences and protect workers in the cultural sector."
Undoubtedly, the clearest commitment is to cinema, in line with the boom experienced by Spanish creation in recent years. In addition to the increase from 70 to 107 million euros in the Fund for Cinematography, another 39 million will be managed by the autonomous communities to promote cinematography in the official languages (10 million), help movie theaters (14.5 million, a 45% more) and create a new line to support the creation of scripts and the development of projects (14.5 million).
The extraordinary plan for the improvement of cultural infrastructures will reach 99 million from the current 55, 80% more, which seeks to improve accessibility, energy efficiency, signage and includes the drafting of works projects for the State Public Libraries of Barcelona and Malaga, the Archaeological Museum of Seville and the National Center of Photography in Soria.
The Directorate General for Books and Reading Promotion maintains its budget at 22 million euros and for the first time includes express support of 135,000 euros for booksellers as support for its platform todotuslibros.com. The National Institute of Performing Arts and Music will have 4.7 million euros more to increase aid. This year the European funds from the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan will be 296 million compared to 364 million in 2022. And in order to implement all these plans, money is budgeted to hire 600 new officials.
