“100,000 Dutch scream to save culture,” reports De Volkskrant. On 20 November, the nation’s “culture lovers” demonstrated in 70 of the country’s towns and cities to protest against government plans to raise VAT on theatre and concert tickets from 6% to 19% and to cut the Ministry of Culture’s budget by 200 million euros. The marchers pledged they would take further action in a wave of protest that would “spread like petrol” to oppose what they see as a bid to destroy their livelihood.
In Italy, workers in the culture sector have also gone out on strike. According to La Repubblica, 250,000 of them have heeded a union call to protest against budget cuts planned for 2011.
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