Tribune. Museums, monuments, cinemas, performance halls: local public cultural companies (SPLs), companies 100% owned by local authorities are at the heart of the influence and attractiveness of their territories. However, it is a baroque situation that the fifty or so SPLs created since 2010 by their territorial communities that are shareholders in the cultural sector are undergoing: they are the only local public actors not able to benefit from sponsorship.
The sponsorship tax regime specified by the General Tax Code dates from 2003, while the founding law of the SPL is seven years later, since it was voted – unanimously by the National Assembly and the Senate, with the support of the government – in May 2010.
It is for this reason that the Federation of elected representatives of local public enterprises (EPL), which brings together all the SPLs in France, at the request of many local elected representatives, has been calling for several years for an evolution of article 238 bis of the Code. general tax system so that these limited companies held exclusively by local authorities can now finally benefit from the same tax regime in favor of patronage as other actors of general interest.
A threat to cultural influence
Patronage for local public cultural companies responds to the logic of territorial patronage, which already allows local communities, management boards, public establishments and associations to benefit from it. This measured evolution of the law should make it possible to put an end to unfounded discrimination, especially for SPLs which benefited from sponsorship when their activity was previously carried out under another statute.
We consider that the reasons why recourse to sponsorship has so far been systematically refused to SPL no longer hold. State services object to us that, even if the activity of SPL is non-profit, they are not eligible for sponsorship because they are incorporated as public limited companies. However, article 238 bis of the General Tax Code already authorizes certain commercial companies to benefit from the tax regime favoring patronage. Why should SPL be excluded?
The argument of loss of tax revenue which is also opposed to us does not stand up against the reality of the facts. Would the State want patrons, who nevertheless wish to favor France and its incomparable cultural influence, to be obliged to make their donations outside French territory for lack of being able to benefit from an incentive device in France? It is time to get out of a narrow tax calculation threatening both the cultural influence of our country and the maintenance of thousands of jobs intended to enhance the cultural diversity of our territories. This ineligibility cannot last.
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