Socialists and Democrats in the European Parliament will lead two important votes during the plenary session, this Monday and Wednesday, aiming at financially supporting the cultural and educational sectors particularly affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Victor Negrescu, vice-president of the EP committee on culture and education, said:

“This resolution on the cultural recovery is our way of expressing solidarity with performers, artists, creators, authors, publishers, their companies and all other cultural creators and workers, who have all been severely struck by the global COVID-19 pandemic. What we aim to do is make sure that a part of the economic recovery measures planned by EU institutions goes to the cultural and creative sectors.

“Therefore, we call on the Commission and member states to earmark, according to their specific needs, at least 2% of the Recovery and Resilience Fund for the recovery of the cultural and creative sectors. We need strong financial plans that will provide a safety net for people working in these sectors, as well as a sense of predictability for the future. Furthermore, we ask for a European framework for working conditions in the cultural and creative sectors at an EU level."

Petra Kammerevert, S&D spokeswoman on culture and education, said:

“According to the EU Commission’s estimation, the European cultural and creative sectors are lacking approximately 40 billion euros due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite this dramatic situation, culture is not receiving the necessary attention in this crisis. This is a sector worth fighting for and this is what we aim to do during this plenary session.

“The pandemic must not lead to the cultural and creative sector in all its manifestations being further side-lined. We need a European rescue package for culture! It is about the survival of our culturally diverse societies. I am therefore glad that we, Socialists and Democrats, were able to prevail against the Conservatives with our demand to provide at least 2% of the Recovery and Resilience Fund for the rescue of the cultural and creative sectors.”

Massimiliano Smeriglio, S&D negotiator on ‘green’ Erasmus+, said:

“We want to highlight the fundamental role played by education, culture, sport and volunteering in the green transition as regards awareness-raising, learning, communication and the sharing of knowledge and good practices.

“Erasmus+, Creative Europe and European Solidarity Corps programmes have great potential to develop innovative ways of tackling environmental challenges and play an important role in achieving the broader aims of the Green Deal. We must, however, keep in mind that effective measures to green the Erasmus+, Creative Europe and European Solidarity Corps programmes will cost money. We insist that new measures must not erode further the already extremely limited budgets of the programmes. Therefore, we also call on the promotion of effective synergies with other relevant funding programmes.”