Extension of the emergency support scheme of Suisseculture Sociale until 31/12/2021
The emergency support via Suisseculture Social will be continued under the Covid-19 law. Full time creative professionals who have their residence in Switzerland, may submit a here request from Thursday, 5 November 2020. We recommend to all creators and artists who are entitled to make a claim and who are in a financial emergency situation, that they submit a request now, and not wait until all of the reserves have been used.
You can submit the request here .
Full-time professionals in the culture sector are still considered to be those who covers at least half of their livelihood with their artistic activities or spends at least half of the normal working time for artistic activities.
It is thus not relevant which status (self-employed, employed, “free-lance”) you have. In general, all those creators and artists in the cultural sector are eligible to make a claim in line with the new Covid-19 Cultural Ordinance.
The emergency support was launched to help the creators and artists in a financial emergency, irrespective of cancelled engagements and missing fees. A financial emergency usually occurs if the income no longer covers the expenditure. The emergency support thus covers the financial deficit. It is calculated on the basis of existential basic needs (SKOS Guidelines) and on the basis of real income and expenditure.
A serious evaluation of the emergency requires an administrative effort of the applicant, which is actually manageable, as long as you submit the required documents and evidence with the application in order to avoid checkbacks and waiting times.
Furthermore, you can find all details for the request application and the guidelines at https://nothilfe.suisseculturesociale.ch
Suisseculture Social is currently changing its web platform due to the changes by the Covid-19 law. Requests may, however, be submitted from Thursday, 5/11/2020.
These are the new and important changes for submission, a.o.:
- Couples can only make a joint submission. The deficit is thus calculated on the basis of the overall deficit of the couple and not on the basis of the deficit of each individual applicant.
- For the transition period until 31/12/2020, the months October to December shall be compacted to an extended period. This means that the emergency support amount for the application in this period is based on 3 months and not, as usual on 2 months.
- The upper asset ceiling per person is CHF 30,000 and increases by CHF 15,000 per child subject to support. This means whoever is above this cap, has basically no entitlement ot the emergency support. Free access assets include, in general: Savings accounts, shares and credit notes, as well as owned property which are NOT permanently inhabited by the owner. This includes for example holiday homes etc.
- For the transition period of the new ordinance Suisseculture Sociale has been allocated a budget of CHF 15m for the emergency support. If this amount is not depleted entirely it must be returned to the Federation. A carryover into 2021 is basically not possible.
It is not a given that we here in Switzerland, compared to other European countries, have the construct of the emergency support which is, by the way, entirely in the hands of the cultural sector. The Association Suisseculture Sociale http://www.suisseculturesociale.ch/index.php?id=145 was founded in 1999 by the cultural sector, as a small sister of the cultural umbrella organisation Suisseculture, so to speak https://www.suisseculture.ch/index.php?id=207 in order to help creators and artists in emergency situations. That’s exactly what it is doing now, even though it acts as a financial aid recipient of the Federation.
(This text stems from SONART – Musikschaffende Schweiz)