Urtasun announces new discounts on museums and theaters in its cultural rights plan.

After a year of work, and approaching his second year at the Ministry of Culture, Ernest Urtasun finally presented his cultural rights plan this Tuesday, a line of work that will span all the department's structures... until 2030. Well beyond a legislative period that for weeks has been more up in the air than ever. "It's a state project," according to Jasmine Beirak , Director General of Cultural Rights, although only six autonomous communities have submitted proposals for the development of this plan. The project has a budget of 79.3 million euros until 2027 to develop a total of 147 measures, one hundred of them in this legislative period.

Of all these, the one that will have the most immediate impact will be the introduction of new discounts on Ministry of Culture facilities for single-parent families and people with disabilities, starting at 25 percent. These discount extensions will be applied starting in 2026 to agencies under the ministry's control; that is, the 16 state museums, the Inaem theaters, the National Library, the archives, and so on. Do the Prado, Reina Sofía, and Thyssen museums fall into this category? Initially, no, but the General Directorate of Cultural Rights will work with these institutions to include them. The plan is to launch this program in 2026.

Those not participating in these plans are the autonomous communities and city councils, which are the institutions that offer the most cultural offerings across the country. The Ministry of Culture hopes to convince regional and local governments by example. So far, in these months of work, the Ministry has only managed to get six regions involved in developing this plan by submitting proposals: Aragon, Murcia, the Canary Islands, Asturias, Catalonia, and the Basque Country. Andalusia and Madrid, two of the regions with the greatest cultural influence in the country, both governed by the People's Party (PP), are missing. The regional minister of the Community of Madrid, Mariano de Paco , has always been highly critical of these plans. The Ministry, however, maintains that dialogue at the sectoral conferences has been satisfactory.

Sumar—and Urtasun, in its name—came to the Ministry of Culture after having promised a new Cultural Rights Law during the campaign. This law, if passed, will be implemented in another term. Jazmín Beirak, who heads a new department created under this minister, says she has preferred to focus on developing a series of immediate impact measures to pave the way for a future law: they are "preparatory work," she said. Of the 147 measures announced, 100 are to be implemented by 2027, with the philosophy that culture "is a fundamental human right and a common good." This ministry understands that access to culture is limited by territorial imbalances, gender gaps, and ethnic issues.

Among the hundreds of measures that the Ministry of Culture has finally put on the table—the initial plan was to do so in May—some stand out, such as a cultural intervention program in prisons aimed at women and an increase in the youth cultural voucher to facilitate access to it for young people with lower incomes, in vulnerable situations, or living in areas with fewer cultural offerings. Regarding linguistics, positive discrimination criteria will be introduced to promote statutory languages, not just official ones, other than Spanish in the grants. There will also be recognition of Romani and Caló, promoting their inclusion in the European Charter.

Other lines of work have already begun: the introduction of gender criteria in grant applications , the office for victims of gender-based violence, and the decolonization of the American and Anthropology museums . Urtasun wants to change the museography of these two centers to better align with her understanding of culture.

Of the €79.3 million budgeted through 2027, €66.2 million will be allocated to aid programs: some newly created, and others already launched. One of these programs has a €4.5 million allocation for "cultural projects with a special social impact," whose requirements align with Sumar's programmatic guidelines. "We have received 1,065 applications, which shows that it was a necessity," said Beirak. The Ministry of Culture has transferred €4 million to the autonomous communities for cultural projects in rural areas. A €1 million aid program for cultural associations and unions has been in place since June.

This project also includes measures that affect other ministries. For example, the Artist's Statute. The ministry continues to say that it will lead the work to fully implement this bill of rights for cultural professionals, but it is not dependent on the Ministry of Culture. Likewise, Urtasun intends to adapt the public procurement law to the cultural sector. It also does not depend on the minister. Culture is also working on a Code of Good Practices that can be applied to all cultural institutions under "ethical criteria, transparency, respect for artistic independence, and recognition of professional work."

According to Urtasun, the presentation of this line of work represents a "milestone." The ministry boasts of being the first country in Europe to work in this direction, something that some Latin American countries have done. At an event held in the gardens of the Reina Sofía, the minister congratulated himself on having been able to "stop the ball": "In Spain, we lack a certain long-term vision. We have jointly stopped to think about what we want public policies to be like in the next 10-15 years." But this goes beyond a project, he said; it is an action plan: "Where there is social inequality, there is also a deep gap in access to goods, knowledge, resources, and cultural practices, and this plan proposes specific measures to bridge that gap and deepen the democratization of culture."