The distribution of cultural offerings across the Netherlands will remain one of the most important criteria for the distribution of government subsidies in the coming years.
That the Cultural Council announced on Thursdayafter the House of Representatives requested this last summer. The Council and the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science had actually wanted to give less priority to the ‘geographical spread’ criterion.
After municipalities, the government is the most important subsidy provider for the cultural sector. 120 cultural institutions that are of national importance receive their subsidies directly from the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science. This always happens for a period of four years. The ministry will spend 230 million euros annually on this in the coming years. Another 265 million euros will be distributed through the government’s six cultural funds.
Political pressure
On Thursday, the Council for Culture published the assessment criteria for the ‘basic cultural infrastructure’ (BIS) for the period 2025-2028. Outgoing State Secretary Gunay Uslu (Culture, D66) had already done this in June the rules are determined. ‘Geographical spread’ was no longer one of the most important assessment criteria, while this was still the case in the BIS period 2021-2024.
However, in July almost the entire House of Representatives voted in favor a motion of coalition parties CDA, Christian Union and VVD to include this distribution across the country as a main criterion. The Ministry of Education, Culture and Science confirmed this this week.
There is a lot of political pressure to increase the cultural offer especially outside the Randstad. The BBB, the winner of the provincial elections in March, among others, advocates this. It is unclear how much the current decision of OCW will make a difference in practice. Geographical distribution was already strongly embedded in the overall assessment of BIS institutions. In the coming period, this will also be more established for festivals and youth performing arts.
Uslu previously said that she wanted to prioritize “peace, trust and continuity” for cultural institutions in the coming BIS period 2025-2028, after the turbulent corona period. The most important substantive change is that diversity, fair practice (including fair payment) and good governance become more important in the assessment.
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