APPROPRIATIONS FOR
CULTURE AND THE
CREATIVE INDUSTRIES
Considerable resources, a “one
-
stop shop” approach,
unsatisfactory controls
2017-2023
Communication
to the Senate Finance Committee
March 2024
2
Summary
Between 2017 and mid-
2023, more than €3 billion in State funding was committed to the
cultural sector outside the budget of the ministry of culture, which is almost equivalent to one
year’s funding f
or this m
inistry’s
culture mission. A distinction should be made between, on
the one hand, appropriations from the recovery plan (€1.6bn), delegated by the Ministry of
Finance to the ministry of culture to support the recovery from the crisis and, on the other
hand, a total of €1.5bn from the future investment programmes (€500m from PIAs 1 and 3
dedicated to culture), extended by the France 2030 programme (€1bn for culture), whose
appropriations are part of a long-term investment rationale: They are managed at the
interministerial level and delegated to general operators such as Bpifrance and
Caisse des
Dépôts
.
These exceptional appropriations, which have been added to the budget of the ministry
of culture, are intended to support the digital transformation of the cultural and creative
industries (CCI) and to structure public support for private players on an unprecedented scale,
especially since the health crisis.
This enquiry follows on from the Court’s work on these unprecedent procedures
1
. It
examines the implementation of these exceptional appropriations, as well as their
relationship with the ministry of c
ulture’s ordinary appropriations, the possible effects on
cultural policy, and the place and role of the ministry. It provides a detailed analysis of a
number of schemes.
A recovery plan that has done more to support the income of the cultural sector than
to bring about its structural transformation
Announced at the end of summer 2020, in a still uncertain health context, the recovery
plan aimed both to
support the sector’s income according to Keynesian logic and to speed up
the structural changes identified as necessary.
With a budget of €1.6 billion for culture, adopted as part of the Finance Act for 2021, it
has led to spending of just over €1.4 billio
n. Because of the health context, it was largely made
up of emergency measures or measures that amplified ordinary law schemes. They have been
effective from the point of view of income for cultural players, in particular through
the priority
given to the heritage sector. The leverage effect of spending in this sector is clearest in terms
of direct and indirect employment.
This plan has made it possible to stabilise the budgetary and financial situation of many
players and, more generally, to safeguard the cultural sector. Government departments and
their employees have been heavily involved, with constant human resources, as have the
1
In the recent period, the Court has published several works on the PIAs
(The Future Investment Programme
,
an
Exceptional Approach, Excesses to be Corrected, Final Observations, December 2015; Implementation of the
Future Investment Programme, preliminary, October 2021; Budget Execution Memorandum: Mission Invest for
France 2030, April 2023) and a thematic public report on the implementation of the recovery plan (Preparation and
Implementation of the Recovery Plan, March 2022). With regard more specifically to the cultural sector, the Court
examined the emergency support measures in the cultural sector during the Covid-19 health crisis as part of three
flash audits (Three Flash Audits on Support Measures in the Culture Sector during the Health Crisis, September
2021) as well as each year as part of the Budget Execution Memoranda for the Culture & Media, Publishing, and
Cultural Industries Missions for 2020, 2021 and 2022.
3
operators responsible for distributing a large proportion of the funding (CNL, ASTP, CNM,
CNC, CMN
2
).
On the other hand, the
plan’s second objective –
to accelerate economic, industrial and
social change
–
was probably too ambitious for a short-term initiative, and was only marginally
implemented. The administrations, already hard-pressed during the lock-down period, drew
up the plan in a hurry in the summer of 2020, when the health situation was still highly unstable.
As a result, while safeguard measures were being taken, the opportunity seems to have been
missed to address transformation issues, particularly in the press, publishing and music
sectors.
The plan has been adapted on several occasions, particularly in response to the
financial difficulties of the major public cultural establishments. The appropriations are
distributed very unevenly between cultural sectors (the film and press industries benefit much
more than publishing, for example), and some of them have also been used to supplement
the financing plans for major works by public establishments.
The need for rapid implementation, set at the highest level of government and closely
monitored, has led to a focus on spending, sometimes to the detriment of public policy
objectives. This objective of spending State appropriations as quickly as possible has also had
an inflationary effect in certain sectors.
The
New Worlds
call for expressions of interest launched by the ministry of culture led
to the selection, in a short space of time, of 264 artistic projects worth a total of €30m. This
scheme has certainly given rise to a great surge of multidisciplinary creation, but it is
regrettable that the effects on artists’ incomes are not yet known. With an additional €30m
earmarked for its renewal, it is imperative that no new funding is committed before a joint
budgetary and cultural assessment has been drawn up, to ensure that it is consistent with pre-
existing schemes and institutions.
Stimulus funds, which were managed by the administration, were able to be reallocated
according to actual needs (in particular aid for freelancers, which was much less in demand
than initially envisaged). On the other hand, in the absence of financial recovery clauses, the
funds entrusted to operators under the recovery plan (as was previously the case under the
emergency plan) are not returned to the State budget, even though their situation at the end
of the health crisis would allow this. Controls aimed at recovering undue payments from certain
aid recipients remain marginal. In addition, the risk of certain schemes financed by exceptional
appropriations becoming permanent has not been completely ruled out.
Funding from PIAs 1 and 3 used for heritage and risky operations
After the first wave of heritage digitisation funded by the Grand Plan d’Investissement
between 2012 and 2016, PIAs 1 and 3 invested little in the field of culture and the cultural and
creative industries. Since 2017, €278m has been spent on this, including €190m transferred
to the culture budget to finance two major heritage restoration projects (Villers-Cotterêts and
Grand Palais).
The first investment strategies in the cultural and creative industries by the
Caisse des
Dépôts et Consignations
-
Banque des Territoires
(CDC) or Bpifrance (using funds granted to
the CDC) supported a number of emblematic cultural projects with real scope in terms of
experimentation and innovation, such as the
Grand Palais Immersif
or the
Philharmonie des
Enfants
. Under the “Culture, Heritage and Digital” call for expressions of interest (€36m
committed, including €10m for the Institute for the
Institut pour le Financement du Cinéma
et
2
Centre National du Livre
(CNL),
Association pour le Soutien au Théâtre Privé
(ASTP),
Centre National de la
Musique
(CNM),
Centre National du Cinéma
(CNC),
Centre des Monuments Nationaux
(CMN)
–
a list of
abbreviations can be found at the end of the report.
4
des Industries Culturelles
(IFCIC)) and the “
Tech and Touch”
cultural and creative industries
(CCI) fund (€34m committed), companies with fragile business models were financed but have
since run into serious difficulties. Risk-taking has been particularly high: for example, the
“Culture, Heritage, Digital” call for expressions of interest launched by CDC had a 35
% loss
rate, much higher than that generally accepted by CDC or Bpifrance, resulting in numerous
failures and the loss of the public money invested. These capital subscriptions have not been
closely monitored, and their actual performance has not been evaluated.
The projects of the companies funded sometimes fall within a very broad conception of
the cultural and creative industries or are clearly not part of them,
such as “sustainable”
consumer products or the garment industry, or even fall within a speculative field (NFT
3
on the
fashion market).
Lastly, these early experiments in investment in the cultural sector suffered from a lack
of a formalised strategy with the ministry of culture, as well as a lack of reflection on the tools
to be used, the type of structuring projects and the desired acceleration effects.
On the other hand, support for the I
nstitut pour le Financement du Cinéma et des
Industries Culturelles
(IFCIC, €60m in appropriations and €25.1m spent
4
), which has excellent
knowledge of cultural businesses and long-standing links with financial backers in the sector,
appears to be consistent with the ambitions of the PIAs and economical with public finances.
France 2030, considerable resources, a strategy that is not clear enough
Following the stimulus plan, the French government has decided to commit €400m
by the end of 2020 as part of PIA 4 to implement the strategy for accelerating the cultural
and creat
ive industries. Then, in autumn 2021, €600m was announced for the image and
digital industries, as part of France 2030. Thanks to an amendment at the end of 2022,
PIA 4 has been attached to France 2030, which brings the total effort for its cultural
compon
ent to €1bn.
The “France 2030” plan is characterised by cumbersome decision
-making processes
and a scattering of information, making it difficult to monitor rigorously. Neither the €400m
acceleration strategy, which emerged from the Forum on Cultural and Creative Industries in
late 2019/early 2020, nor even the list of the 19 measures selected have been made public.
Nevertheless, the communication surrounding the cultural strand of France 2030 regularly
refers to these 19 measures, and the measures (calls for expressions of interest and calls for
projects) are for the most part numbered by reference to this framework. The consolidation of
the successive components within France 2030 has not been published either. As a result,
the relationship between the measures and the overall objectives is difficult to understand.
Assessing them over time will therefore be complex, especially as the impact and results
indicators for the calls for expressions of interest and the France 2030 calls for projects have
not yet been fully defined.
So far, only measures that allow calls for tender to be issued quickly have been
implemented, sometimes at the risk of not addressing the more central infrastructure issues
and of not mobilising the regulatory lever.
Structural changes in the cultural sector may justify government support. However, the
future investment plans (PIAs) appear to be generally unsuited to this sector. In fact, they are
insufficiently linked to the objectives and challenges of public policy.
3
Non-fungible token:
a cryptographic certificate associated with a digital object (image, video, music,
etc.) whose authenticity and traceability are guaranteed by
blockchain
.
4
Not including the support received under the AMI mentioned above.
5
The rapid implementation of competitive tendering can create windfall effects and
obviate the need for public authorities to use regulatory tools. Finally, the original rationale of
the PIAs, which was to use repayable advances or co-investments to encourage the private
sector to become involved, has gradually been replaced by a rationale of subsidies. As a
result,
Caisse des Dépôts-Banque des Territoires
and Bpifrance find themselves in the
paradoxical position of paying, for the most part in this sector, subsidies, a task which in
principle falls to the ministry of culture.
A steering system that is largely disconnected from cultural policy
objectives
The fact that the PIAs and France 2030 are managed by the general secretariat for
investment (SGPI) means that the ministry of culture is no longer responsible for the strategic
management, allocation of funding and control of a significant proportion of its annual budget.
The ministry of culture is not formally a decision-maker, even though it was behind the
design of the strategy: it generally drafts the specifications and is involved in the appraisal
stages, and often sits as an observer on the committees made up of professionals who select
the winners. It is therefore not fully in a position to guarantee that this substantial funding is
consistent with the objectives of cultural policy (i.e. preserving and enhancing historical
heritage, supporting artistic creation, contributing to artistic education and the transmission of
knowledge, and developing the cultural economy and cultural industries).
More generally, the segmentation of decision-making between the SGPI, the major
generalist operators and the ministry is a factor of disempowerment.
Within the funds allocated to France 2030 (€1bn),
de facto
priority has been given to the
image industries through the
Grande Fabrique de l'Image
project alone (€350m), which
consists in particular of the construction of new film studios, digital studios and audiovisual
technology training schools, without any sufficiently well-founded needs studies. In addition,
the use of start-up
funding for innovative cultural projects by public establishments rather than
direct subsidies raises many questions.
The initial results of the acceleration strategy in terms of private investment and sector
structuring are generally unknown, due to insufficient monitoring and evaluation. If we don't
want to run the risk of depriving the ministry of the means to fulfil its missions over the long
term, it must take over the steering of the measures initiated as part of France 2030 and
significantly strengthen their monitoring. This would enable it to build up its expertise in digital
issues, so that it can work effectively with cultural businesses.
In conjunction with the directorate heneral for enterprise, the ministry of culture must
reflect on the major issues (both technological and cultural) and on the appropriate tools to
create a fertile ground for innovation and accelerate effects with a high cultural value. The
ministry should be the guarantor of the long-term strategy and the decision-maker for the
appropriations allocated, while the
Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations
and Bpifrance could
be mobilised for innovative projects for their entrepreneurial and financial expertise.
In recent years, the way in which the future investment plans (PIAs) and France 2030
have been managed has resulted in announcements of amounts of public support without a
clearly established strategy, a sense of urgency imposed at the highest level of government,
the absence of a clause requiring unused appropriations to be returned to the government
budget, and the transition of the PIAs from a system of repayable advances to one of majority
subsidies.
What’s more, this approach leads to a departure from the principles applicable to publ
ic
finances (annuality, speciality, unity, even sincerity) and sidelines Parliament. The return of
exceptional appropriations to the ministerial budget would improve parliamentary control.
6
Recommendations
1.
Prior to any new use of funds, carry out an independent evaluation of the
Mondes
Nouveaux
scheme, particularly from the point of view of artists’ remuneration and the
relationship with pre-existing schemes and institutions
(ministry of culture).
2.
Jointly define the objectives pursued by future investments and more clearly define the
scope of the PIAs in the cultural and creative industries sector
(general secretariat for
investment, ministry of culture)
.
3.
Ensure a clear link between the budgetary architecture and the France 2030 strategy, for
the culture component
(general secretariat for investment, ministry of culture)
.
4.
Strictly apply the doctrine of investments for the future and reserve PIA funding for projects
that meet pre-established innovation criteria
(general secretariat for investment, ministry
of culture)
.
5.
Introduce a robust procedure for monitoring and evaluating the appropriations for the PIAs
and France 2030 in order to enable parliamentary control
(general secretariat for
investment, ministry of culture)
.
6.
Provide for an explicit procedure for returning or reallocating unused exceptional
appropriations
(general secretariat for investment, ministry of culture)
.
7.
In the France 2030 decision-making process, give the Ministry of Culture a place that will
enable it to fulfil its role as leader of cultural policy
(general secretariat for investment,
ministry of culture)
.