The first meeting of the European Parliament’s CULT Committee was an opportunity to sweep up a series of subjects relevant to the creative industries at the start of the European term of office: access to structural funds, supervision of AI, revision of the Audiovisual Media Services Directive, the MEDIA program. However, the debates remained relatively superficial, not least because the Commissioners in charge have not yet been appointed. The European Parliament’s Committee on Culture and Education (CULT) held its first back-to-school meeting today. The heads of the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture (DG EAC) and Directorate-General Connect visited the committee to take stock of almost all the issues within its remit. As the new Commissioners in charge of these DGs had not yet been appointed, discussions focused on relatively technical issues, but fundamental to the cultural sector. Both made a point of reassuring the audience that, for them, culture was a central element of European identity. Roberto Viola, head of DG Connect, and in…
