Catalan pro-independence left will reject Socialist budget if their red line is not accepted: streaming services, naming Netflix multiple times, must be required to offer 7.5% of their catalog in Basque, Catalan and Galician to operate in Spain

22 comments

  1. I know that this seems like very minor news but the government may fall on this. For some foreigners this looks like a very odd hill to die. But the status of the co-official languages in entertainment is one of the key points of Catalan nationalism. Increasing the availability of books, comics movies, tv series, videogames and other entertainment in Catalan. Like if we are independent we would be able to force studios to dub to Catalan movies that exhibited in cinemas.

    Translation:

    ##ERC demands the PSOE to protect Catalan on Netflix before Friday or it will reject the Budget.

    ERC plans to present a full amendment to the General State Budget (PGE) if before Friday the Government does not shield the Catalan in the audiovisual law or assess compliance with the agreement between the Republicans and the PSOE for the 2020 accounts. This has been indicated by the spokeswoman of ERC, Marta Vilalta, at a press conference on Monday at the party headquarters.

    ###ERC conditions the Budgets to 7.5% of Netflix to be in Catalan, Galician or Euskera

    According to Vilalta, the protection of the Catalan language is a “big stone in the road” in the face of giving its approval to the parliamentary processing of the Budgets. As reported by elDiario.es, ERC conditions the accounts to 7.5% of Netflix and the rest of the platforms to be in Catalan, Galician or Basque, despite the fact that this is an issue that should be materialized not in the Budgets but in the audiovisual law that the Government is preparing.

    Vilalta explained that the Republicans have had the first contacts with the Government to talk about budgets, but it is still necessary to “create favorable conditions” for negotiation. The two most urgent requests that ERC has moved to the Government are the protection of the Catalan language in the framework of the audiovisual legislation, which includes its shielding in the television platforms, and the concretion of the commitments of investment that the Executive assumed with Catalonia in the previous budgets.

    While waiting for the Government’s response, ERC foresees the presentation of an amendment to the totality, taking into account that “the limit is Friday”, has pointed out Vilalta, who has stressed that now “the ball is in the court” of Sánchez.

    “They know that to open the negotiation it is necessary that the previous agreements are fulfilled and that the Catalan language is protected within the framework of the audiovisual legislation in the Spanish state. This opens the door to negotiation. Now it depends on them whether the door opens or closes and we are forced to present an amendment to the totality,” said the spokeswoman.

    Vilalta stressed that today begins a “key week” to put “hands to work” to these two issues. ERC and the Government already held the first formal meeting at the end of last week. The meeting was attended by representatives of the central Executive and the Catalan formation. There have also been other more informal contacts before and after this meeting. However, it has not been possible to unblock the negotiation.
    Junts will decide on Thursday

    Junts por Catalunya, for its part, has announced that it will wait until Thursday to decide if it presents an amendment to the totality to the budgets. This has been explained by the vice president and spokeswoman of the party, Elsa Artadi, who has left the door open for the amendment to be presented jointly with ERC. In this sense, Artadi has again insisted on the need to make “common front” in Madrid to “assert” the “power” of the Catalan parties.

    The spokeswoman explained that the amendment is already drafted, so the decision can be taken “at the last minute”. As she explained, the main issues that will influence the decision will be the possible transfer of Cercanías, also the audiovisual law and the management of COVID-19 funds. Artadi has advanced that the meeting will also be attended by the Minister of Economy of the Generalitat, Jaume Giró.

    However, the spokeswoman has assured that they have “little confidence” in the Government, which they assure is responding with “immobility” and “little reception”. “Confident we have never been, but we will work until the last minute,” said Artadi.
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    Translated with http://www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

  2. Sounds reasonable. But, as always, the fucking PSOE will prefer to let the government fall instead of conceding something as simple as this.

  3. I object. As long as it is in any Portuguese variant it’s good for me (to hell with the fake norms of the local government).

  4. I think requiring dubbing in languages like Catalan and Basque is very reasonable, but producing a considerable percentage of shows to cover those languages just may not be feasible. I, like millions of Spanish speakers, have watched my share of Catalan shows so maybe it is feasible. In fact, watching Catalan shows dubbed in Castilian is so convincing because of the language similarities and the fact that the actors do the dubbing themselves.

  6. Netflix has become such a staple of European entertainment that it only makes sense that our governments should back legislation that advocates for minority languages like this.

  8. The cynic in me says that if this gets passed, it’s time to get a VPN if I don’t want to pay for a heavily worse product than in other countries (that is, if the product is offered in Spain at all).

    Though it seems PSOE isn’t much better for calling for quotas on European and Spanish language productions in the first place.

  9. Sounds reasonable. Considering that most content has already been dubbed to these languages, Netflix and other platform would just need to include the audio and not spend a dime. I don’t get why they don’t do that already.

  10. It’s a ridiculous idea, it has no sense and will try to make a private company losing money by law.

    But still a good point to make this far-left government fall.

  13. this is even dumber than nations forcing mandatory dubbing on foreign entertainment, i learned english because my government didn’t give a fuck, we still speak the language, and a lot of the population speaks english because of it, which is a fuck ton more useful for everything than some shitty ass national pride

    language is so important, but languages come and go, there is never any lingua franca. I feel like i’m taking crazy pills here. English will disappear in the next thousand years as with everything else around, and our bones, yet we cater to these traditionalist handicaps who know nothing but put their hands in the sand and cry in their pillows as their “heritage” is erased. Bitch, right it down for historical record, like all previous languages. that’s it.

    I think i need to sit down lol

  16. I don’t get these shenanigans around the Spanish minority languages. Especially Galician and Basque. There’s like 3 million people who speaks Galician and less than a million who speaks Basque. Galician and Catalan are basically just Spanish with typos and a funny accent. Breaking the government for something ridiculous like this…

  17. I’m all for making Netflix jump through hoops but asking for dubs instead of subs I find totally weird. I guess it has the upside of creating jobs for tons of voice actors.

  19. If we don’t get rid of the nationalists blackmailing we’re going to fall hard.

    The main problem of Spain is that there isn’t a single left wing party that opposes nationalists’ deliriums for some weird reasons (also paradoxical because the left is supposed to fight for equal right for every citizen and not giving privileges to just some).

    I point that as the main problem because there are tons of people in Spain who would never vote a right wing party but they also don’t like the blackmailing and supremacist aura of nationalists, and it is going to perpetuate the issue.

    Our only salvation is a big coalition between a center-right party and an eventual center-left party that opposes nationalists or we are doomed.

  20. Might as well. Psoe is not doing anything on labour reform plan. And that is the most important component for next gen EU.

  22. That seems like a more than reasonable demand. I don’t really see why a Socialist government would reject it.

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