“Cura Italia” Relief Can’t Forget Culture

In this trying time for Italy, SLC-CGIL (the communication workers’ union), STRADE (the section devoted to translators), and the trade associations backing this petition are doing all they can to amplify the voice and ensure the visibility of the many atypical workers they represent, who are currently excluded from the income support measures in the “Cura Italia” decree.

These creative figures include writers, translators, illustrators, photographers, and cartoonists. Though they play a crucial role in the book industry and the cultural marketplace, they are a financially vulnerable group, plagued by low pay and constant collection problems. Many are not registered with the SIAE or other copyright collecting societies, and since they primarily earn their income from authors’ rights, they are shut out of the social security system. They’re an invisible multitude, numbering in the thousands.

And although culture will carry on its mission, it shouldn’t be forced to crawl.

With all bookshops shuttered (a crushing blow for the independent ones) and all fairs and live events cancelled, the whole publishing industry is on standby. The immediate effects are expected to be devastating. In a newsletter dated 24 March, the AIE (Associazione Italiana Editori – Italian Publishers Association) estimated that in 2020 there will be “18,600 fewer works published; 39.3 million fewer copies printed and packaged.” Moreover, a report from the AIE committee set up to monitor the impact of Covid-19 on the publishing sector, dated 30 March, predicts that the number of books translated this year will drop by 3,100 titles.

Remote working and e-commerce will not be enough to ensure real continuity or make up for the gap in the end market.

The Italian government must therefore rapidly expand its financial support measures to cover cultural creators and provide them with an adequate safety net.

Under article 27 of the recent Cura Italia decree, these professional figures do not qualify for one-off financial assistance because there is currently no way for them to be registered with social security. This is an incomprehensible oversight that we believe should be redressed by letting them apply for the reddito di emergenza and extending these emergency payments beyond the month of March.

The emergency fund for the performing arts, film, and audio-visual work (article 89 of the decree) should also be extended to cultural creators who work in publishing. Alternatively, a specific fund with a similar endowment (at least 130 million euros) should be set up for the publishing industry, while weighing the possibility of turning it into a structural fund. This idea also has the support of the leading publishers’ associations, AIE and ADEI.

SLC-CGIL, together with STRADE, AITI, ANITI and AI – Autori di Immagini, are asking the Italian government to make sure no one is left behind. Even in the cultural sector.

Translation by Johanna Bishop.

First signers include:

Massimo Arcangeli, linguist, author, critic

Stefano Arduini, Nida School of Translation Studies

Gabriella Armando, publisher

Davide Camarrone, author, journalist, director of Festival delle Letterature Migranti

Giulio Cavalli, author, actor

J.M. Coetzee, author, Nobel laureate

Giovanni De Mauro, editor of Internazionale

Fulvia Degl’Innocenti, author, president of ICWA

Jared Diamond, author

Hernan Diaz, author

Catherine Dunne, author

Angelo Ferracuti, author

Ernesto Ferrero, author, translator

Jonathan Franzen, author

Fabio Geda, author

Vera Gheno, author

Daniel Handler a.k.a Lemony Snicket, author

Nicola Lagioia, author, director of the Turin International Book Fair

Loredana Lipperini, author, radio host

Valerio Magrelli, author, translator

Robert Menasse, author

Carlotta Natoli, actor

Salvatore Natoli, philosopher, scholar

Giuseppe Patota, linguist at Accademia della Crusca

Roberto Piumini, author

Antonio Prete, author, translator

Fabio Pusterla, poet, translator

Christian Raimo, author

Livia Rocchi, author, ICWA board member

Isabella Salmoirago, author, ICWA board member

Sara Saorin and Francesca Segato, publishers

Chiara Segré, author, vice-president of ICWA

Evgenij Solonovich, translator

Flavio Soriga, author

David Szalay, author

Bruno Tognolini, author

Thomas Trabacchi, actor

Tiziana Triana, editorial director

Clara Usón, author

Chiara Valerio, author

Giorgio Vasta, author, director of Book Pride

Rosa Ventrella, author

Constant updates: https://www.traduttoristrade.it/2020/emergenza-covid-19-appello-al-governo-petizione/

[cover photo by Eugenio Mazzone on Unsplash]