92000E3266

WRITTEN QUESTION P-3266/00

by Stavros Xarchakos (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(12 October 2000)

Subject: Support for the arts in the EU

Can the Commission give details of Community legislation providing for EU subsidies for all types of schools and academies of music (both public and private) in the Member States? What Community programmes are in force which provide for financial aid to such institutions?

Which Community initiatives provide subsidies for projects to promote the book sector? Are there plans to provide aid for the publication of major works of European and world literature, such as the ancient Greek tragedies, and to subsidise pioneering projects such as the translation of ancient philosophical, historical and scientific texts into all the official languages of the Union?

Answer given by Mrs Reding on behalf of the Commission

(14 November 2000)

The Community action programme in the field of education, Socrates, subsidises transnational activities initiated by institutional partnerships involving at least three participating countries. In principle, the Comenius action on school education is open to all establishments recognised as schools by the participating countries. A detailed list of eligible institutions appears in the programme application guide. None of the Socrates actions is exclusively concerned with the arts.

The Culture 2000 programme, which is the single financing and programming instrument for cultural cooperation within the Community established by Decision No 508/2000/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 14 February 2000(1), is designed, inter alia, to promote cultural dialogue and mutual knowledge of the culture and history of European peoples and to encourage creativity and the transnational dissemination of culture.

The objectives of the framework programme are to be achieved through actions which are either vertical (concerning one cultural field) or horizontal (associating several cultural fields).

In the case of books and reading, the vertical approach of the Culture 2000 programme is intended, in particular: to improve awareness and the distribution of literary creation and the history of the European people through supporting the translation of literary, dramatic and reference works mldr.

As regards support for certain types of project, the Commission would inform the Honourable Member that the 2001 project priorities are to be announced under the call for programme proposals to be published in the Official Journal during November 2000.

(1) OJ L 63, 10.3.2000.