Cultural activities and projects aiming to protect, safeguard, re-use, develop and promote Europe’s shared cultural heritage will be supported under the 2018 European Year of Cultural Heritage, MEPs and European Commission and Council representatives agreed informally on Thursday. The European Parliament secured a €8 million budget for these activities. The deal still needs to be endorsed by Parliament as a whole.
Parliament managed to ensure its active involvement in managing the Year, as it will be able to participate as an observer in the meetings of national coordinators convened by the Commission for the running of the European Year. Parliament has also ensured a substantial improvement in financial terms as compared to the original proposal from the Commission.
“We have successfully concluded the inter-institutional negotiations regarding the ’2018 European Year of Cultural Heritage’. The most important victory for me is the inclusion of Parliament in all these activities that will take place during next year, most of them dedicated to the preservation and promotion of our common cultural heritage”, said rapporteur Mircea Diaconu (ALDE, RO).
“I don’t believe the EU could have celebrated 100 years since the end of the Great War in a more beautiful or appropriate manner. We have, after all, managed to build a political and economic union based on our shared culture and history,” Mr Diaconu added, stressing that a successful European Year of Cultural Heritage is “a matter of European pride and dignity.”
The main objective of this European Year is to promote the role of European cultural heritage as a pivotal component of cultural diversity, by making cultural heritage accessible to more people, promoting innovative models of management of cultural heritage, developing specialised skills or promoting heritage as a source of inspiration for contemporary creation and innovation.
Next steps
Parliament will vote on this agreement in plenary session in April and the Council should adopt this text at the first reading
