Exclusive: Barcelona proposes new measures, including tax free shoots in city

Barcelona City Council has set up 10 key measures to help alleviate the effects of the coronavirus on the city’s cultural, including a call for grants and subsidies to be created to fund 100% of the taxes for audiovisual shoots in the city up to 31 December 2020. 

The municipal government’s aim is to “try and help to keep culture alive and helping us to get back to normal once we get through this episode,” it said in a statement.

The key initiatives and proposals from the list that affect the film, TV and commercials sectors are the following….

1. Call for €1 million extra subsidy applications aimed at alleviating the effects of the crisis, putting special emphasis on the most vulnerable structures linked to grass-roots culture in all its variants and sectors (local theatres, creation spaces, cultural cooperatives and other entities in the sector).

2. Rescheduling of the big cultural events and music festivals held in Barcelona if necessary. A coordination body has been set up, on the initiative of the Barcelona Institute of Culture (ICUB) with the various people in charge of the city's events and infrastructures, so they can reschedule them if necessary and prevent cancellations.

3. Taxes. More funds allocated to the call for ICUB property-tax subsidy applications for cultural organisations open to the public, such as theatre halls, cinemas, creation spaces, the cultural trade and bookshops. Grants and subsidies created to fund 100% of the taxes for audiovisual shoots in the city up to 31 December 2020.

4. Prioritisation of the regular channels for supporting the city’s cultural fabric, such as grants and subsidies, programmes and public communications. Specific application in the cultural sphere of general provisions for maintaining contracts and the jobs that derive from them, extending and amending the terms where necessary. Consideration of the effects of the state of alert on future calls for grants and subsidies.

Barcelona City Council is also calling on the Spanish government to reduce cultural VAT to 0% at least until December 2020. As well as establish new criteria for adapting the definition of “force majeure”. This is to enable - if necessary - a rescheduling of cultural events without prejudice to all the parties.

It is also calling on the Catalan government to reach an agreement with the Catalan Finance Institute on opening a line of micro-credits of up to €20,000, at very low or zero interest, to attend to the demands and needs of small and medium-sized cultural enterprises, including production companies.

More details to follow soon....

A useful place for further information is the Barcelona Film Commission.