To reassure culture, Roselyne Bachelot is doing something new with old

This morning on France Inter, Roselyne Bachelot, Minister of Culture, faced the wrath of artists, furious that theaters were closed when the crowd of consumers jostled in the department stores that remained open.

To bring a little balm to the hearts of theater and cinema actors, owners of theaters who still do not know when they will be able to reopen, the Minister has taken money out of her sleeve, a lot of money.

A billion in aid

Roselyne Bachelot explained that the administrative closure of places of culture cost the sector around 1 billion euros but that the government had done more than compensate because it had provided 1.1 billion euros in support of which 535 million in loans Guaranteed by the State and more than 400 million in direct and indirect aid for cinema and audiovisual.

Well aware that cultural professionals do not ask for money but the possibility of working, the Minister has drawn out her ultimate weapon: to make the Gafa pay!

It always works to distract attention.

"Netflix should pay between 150 and 200 million euros to support culture" she declared at the microphone of France Inter.

It is true.

But, first of all, it is a figure which was already circulating under the ministry of his predecessor Franck Riester and then the signing of the SMAD decree (on-demand audiovisual media services) was very late.

Second quarter 2021

Initially, the decree was to be signed before the end of 2020. Today Roselyne Bachelot declared that her ministry had transmitted to the CSA the draft SMAD decree which integrates video-on-demand platforms into the funding system of Culture.

This decree must go through the CSA, then through the Council of State and finally through the European Commission.

It should not be definitively signed until the beginning of the second quarter of 2021.

200 million for Netflix

This decree will require Netflix, Amazon, Apple, Disney + to devote between 20% and 25% of their turnover in France to film production (at least 20% of obligations) and audiovisual (80% of obligations).

Netflix, which passed the milestone of 9 million French subscribers in October 2020, should achieve a turnover of 1.2 billion euros in our country.

But the base for the calculation of its obligations should rather be 1 billion.

Its obligations should therefore amount to nearly 200 million euros (or 20% of a billion).

But they will only run from the signing of the decree, therefore, around April.

The amount due for 2021 will therefore be lower.

Netflix being mainly a platform for series, it will invest around 160 million in the audiovisual sector and only 40 million in cinema.

This is less than France Télévisions (around 60 million), less than the TF1 group (around 45 million) and less than the M6 ​​group (around 35 million).