Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-10-24-Speech-1-129"
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"en.20051024.17.1-129"2
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".
Mr President, I should like to thank the Members for their very positive contribution. It is true that European cinema has several dimensions to it. It has an economic dimension. It is undoubtedly one of the cultural industries that makes a positive contribution to the important issue of industrial competitiveness featured in the Lisbon Strategy. However, it is not only a commercial industry, it is also a cultural industry, as it is enriched by cultural diversity. What we are talking about are the stories of Europeans, which must be told by Europeans; the dreams of Europeans, which must be put on film by Europeans; and cultural diversity in its entirety, which must find its way onto our cinema screens. That is why the Commission truly is keen to invest in cultural diversity and to help this diversity to function.
I will not repeat here the comments made by Members, because I almost entirely agree with them. I would, however, like to come back to two points, which I did not mention in my introduction. Firstly, I agree with all those who said that digital technology is of the utmost importance: digital technology is an opportunity for diversity because, once the technology is installed, it will enable films to be distributed much more easily and at a lower cost. Secondly, it will be much easier to choose between languages than with today’s analogue system. Digital technology therefore represents, in my opinion, an opportunity for our film industries and an opportunity for us to learn about other cultures in Europe. Furthermore, that is one of the reasons why the MEDIA 2007 programme is seeking to make further progress along this path.
I have been very alert to the comments made with regard to protecting young people. Rest assured that protecting young people in the audiovisual sector is one of my main priorities. It also features in the special recommendations and in the Television Without Frontiers Directive, which is currently being revised. Members’ demands concerning the protection of young people against any possible forms of abuse are therefore taken into account.
I have also been very alert to the comments made by some Members about the new Member States and about countries with a lower audiovisual production capacity or a small linguistic area. I am not only addressing you here in my role as Commissioner, but also as someone who hails from Luxembourg. Each time a film is made in the Luxemburgish language – and such films do exist – I feel proud and moved. I would like all of the small linguistic areas to be able to produce films in their own language, even if the market for these films is, it must be acknowledged, very small. Thus, there is all the more reason to help these small linguistic areas, and we are doing so in the MEDIA programme.
There is another point which, I believe, I put forward within the Committee on Culture and Education, but which I should like to reiterate here, in plenary: my proposal for positive discrimination in favour of the new Member States, which are in need of more clearly targeted help, enabling them unquestionably to take advantage of the MEDIA programme, was unanimously agreed upon at the Council of Ministers. All of the ministers, even those who had to give up a slice of their cake in order to help the others, were in agreement. This is the Europe that we cherish. This is the Europe of solidarity, and I am pleased that the Members have further enhanced this aspect of solidarity through their amendments. We need film production to be diverse, including in those territories with a low audiovisual production capacity and a small linguistic area, because those fragments of our Europe also contribute to the European patchwork of cultures.
We need everyone; we need widely spoken languages and large countries, lesser spoken languages and small countries, because there is no such thing as the large, and important, and the small, and unimportant, in all of this. There are only great cultures, be they large or small, and I am proud to be able to contribute to this patchwork of diversity."@en1
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