Would you like to earn the same today as you did ten years ago? No? This is what happens in the cultural sector. And that has to change. This weekend the annual Amsterdam Uitmarkt will festively herald the new cultural season. For many museums and venues, there is still little cause for joy. Many foresee an uncertain future.
About the author
Wim Pijbes is director of the Droom en Daad philanthropic fund and former director of the Rijksmuseum.
It is also important for countless individual artists, musicians, writers and other makers in our country. Visitors still fail or decide to buy a ticket at the last minute. Vermeer, Stromae or any other blockbuster hit can count on a massive influx, but the sector will have to work hard this season for the other cultural offerings.
And that is why the cultural sector, together with policy makers and politicians, will consider the future in the Paradis debate on Sunday. How to respond to the next corona wave, energy costs, inflation and the war on the continent? Good questions, because the sector has been more closed than open in recent years and, as elsewhere, has to contend with price increases and lack of personnel.
Clarity
What is not on the agenda on Sunday, but is extremely urgent, is to quickly provide clarity about the upcoming Culture Plan period 2025-2028 – in addition to a thorough repair of years of overdue maintenance of the regular culture budget. Prinsjesdag is the perfect time for this.
Because what’s going on? The Ministry of Education, Culture and Science distributes the government subsidies every four years, after advice from the Council of Culture. Municipalities and provinces follow this system, whereby various institutions receive a subsidy from the lower governments linked to this. The process for submitting plans and the necessary advice is fixed, as is the timeline for assessment and award. For many, this procedure will start at the end of this year, collecting data, agreements for the future, multi-year plans, et cetera.
Budgets
For example, the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science is distributing 413 million euros annually in the current Culture Plan, which will run until the end of 2024. In addition, national museums receive 217 million euros in subsidy through the so-called Heritage Act, bringing the total to 630 million euros.
In the previous Culture Plan of Minister Bussemaker (2017-2020), in addition to the contributions to the national museums, 380 million euros could be spent annually on institutions and cultural funds. Her predecessor Halbe Zijlstra, after drastic cutbacks of 200 million euros, was left with 326 million annually for the period 2013-2016.
In the years 2009-2012, 530 million euros could be distributed (at the time including the national museums). If you go back even further, you will see that under State Secretary Medy van der Laan (2003-2006) the total national culture budget amounted to 655 million euros and that Rick van der Ploeg, State Secretary between 1998 and 2002, was able to allocate at least 657 million euros annually. In 2002, government expenditure on culture even amounted to 710 million euros.
hollowing out
Fine grinders will no doubt say that one year this or that was part of it or not, the fact is that the freely disposable budget for institutions has been structurally eroded in two decades. The growth of fixed costs (wage increases, inflation, rent, energy costs, insurance premiums, pension costs, regulatory burden) was stronger than the increase in variable income. Fixed income (subsidy) is no longer sufficient for the increased fixed costs; variable income is then used to cover fixed costs. That goes wrong once.
Fortunately, during the corona crisis, the previous cabinet made funds available for ‘recovery, renewal and growth’, but this 170 million for the coming years is fully earmarked to absorb the consequences of corona, but also to compensate earthquake damage to national monuments in Groningen. . Useful and necessary, but the sector does little with it.
To invest
There is investment money. Because less than two years ago, the cabinet announced on Budget Day that ‘(…) future generations should be able to live in a Netherlands with good care, good education, a livable environment and enough money to spend on their own. (…)’ The cabinet earmarked 20 billion euros for a National Growth Fund to stimulate knowledge development, physical infrastructure, research, development and innovation. Little has come of this. Proposed infrastructure projects suddenly turn out to be plans for yesterday’s world. More asphalt is not the future. If you want to better connect people, you invest in culture.
A condition is that institutions and artists are duly honored. Cultural policy is by definition long-term policy, so anyone who says they want to stimulate knowledge development, research, development, innovation and connecting people is investing in the creative and cultural sector.
Several of our artists, photographers, DJs, architects, choreographers, designers and musicians belong to the international top. We can be proud of that. The insulting of Rem Koolhaas about his plans for the Binnenhof, the shameful words of ministers during the corona press conferences or the unnecessarily long keeping Dutch museums closed, unfortunately show that politicians are not always understanding. Precisely for a dynamic sector bursting with talent, who time and again proves to excel in what our country is increasingly lacking: vision, vitality and trust.
Valuation
So let’s start appreciating that better. And then on Budget Day, to structurally increase the current Culture Plan for the years 2025-2028 (and beyond) that was completely disrupted and outdated by corona. Don’t leave the sector in the dark any longer, take another look at the budget at the beginning of this century. Add that to the current price level: 710 million euros, plus a correction according to the CBS price index, makes slightly more than
1 billion euros.