internet supply tax

Isona Passola, the producer of the internationally-acclaimed Catalan film ‘Pa Negre’ (Black Bread), the Spanish contender for an Oscar in 2013, believes that “Catalan culture can be appreciated worldwide”. Passola has made many historical documentaries and is now convinced that “life acquires meaning when working for collective benefit”. Last year she presented ‘L’Endemà’, a documentary aimed at countering the arguments against Catalan independence and financed through crowd-funding. Passola, the current president of the Catalan Film Academy, is “a true defender of the right to form a family” and “has never lost the joie de vivre”.

On Wednesday the Catalan Parliament passed two important bills. With 74% support, it has approved the Law of External Action and Relations with the EU. Only two parties voted against it, the Spanish nationalist People’s Party (PP) – which runs the Spanish Government – and Ciutadans (C’s). A third party, the alternative left and radical independence party CUP, abstained because it considered that the law was not “ambitious enough”. All the rest supported the bill, which mainly puts in order the existing bodies and mechanisms, although it also creates some new ones, in line with the Catalan Government’s powers in this area, recognized by the Catalan Statute of Autonomy. The other bill is the tax on Internet suppliers, which aims to fund the Catalan audiovisual sector, affected by Internet piracy. No party voted against it. The new tax aims to collect some €20.5 million per year and it is welcomed by the cinema industry, and rejected by the main Internet suppliers.