The Basque Government calls for violence not to be trivialised in society, nor in football

• The spokesperson, Bingen Zupiria, has condemned and rejected the acts of violence that occurred at a football match and calls for collaboration to eradicate this violent behaviour in sport
• The monitoring which we have been working on for years sets the behaviour at football matches at 8.93 points

The spokesperson for the Basque Government and Minister of Culture and Linguistic Policy, Bingen Zupiria, appeared at the usual press conference after the Governing Council meeting.

At today's meeting, the Government spoke in favour of taking into consideration the proposal for a law to amend the Basque Cultural Heritage Law of 2019. The law currently distinguishes between three levels of protection of the assets that make up the Basque cultural heritage: special, medium and basic. As explained by the spokesperson, the draft law prepared by the EAJ/PNV and PSE parliamentary groups proposes a change linked to the basic level as they have detected the need to give a greater and better definition in the Heritage Law that protects the immovable, movable and intangible cultural assets of artistic, historical, archaeological, paleontological, ethnological, anthropological, linguistic, scientific, industrial, landscape and architectural value of the Basque Country.

AGREEMENTS OF THE GOVERNING COUNCIL

As usual, the spokesperson, Bingen Zupiria, provided information on other issues discussed and approved in the Governing Council meeting.

Zupiria explained that the Government has given the green light to the order regulating and calling for exceptional subsidies to local entities for the implementation of a Universal Accessibility Strategy and for the execution of the actions that are included, with a budget of five million euros. The order includes two lines of aid. The first is intended for the creation of plans under a broad accessibility perspective, in addition to architectural, visual, auditory, cognitive and organic barriers in the physical environment, as well as in public services or information services, and the second line is aimed at adapting the physical environment to the needs of physical, sensory and cognitive accessibility with itinerary designs using elevators or elevator platforms, adapted services or improvements in signage, among others.

The Department of Health informed today's Governing Council of the collaboration agreement signed, together with the Department for Economic Development, Sustainability and the Environment, with the Colleges of Veterinarians and Pharmacists of the Basque Country for the promotion, implementation and use of the electronic veterinary prescription. The implementation of this prescription will now allow effective control in the traceability and rational use of medicines, increasing safety and better animal health and welfare. This collaboration agreement, launches the PRESCRIVET platform, which is a tool for all agents involved in the use of the electronic veterinary prescription, such as owners of livestock farms, pharmacists, commercial dispensers and registered veterinarians.

Likewise, the Government has approved 264,000 euros in 2024 to help 40 people with a degree in Law who want to prepare their access to the Judicial and Fiscal careers, as well as to the Administration's Body of Lawyers. The objective is to enhance the stability and the adequate level of quality of the Public Justice Service; therefore, it has been considered appropriate to continue with this line of aid initiated more than two decades ago with satisfactory results. In an innovative move, this year applications will only be processed electronically.

Finally, in relation to the Department of Culture, the Governing Council has agreed to grant a direct subsidy of 30,000 euros to HEKIMEN - the Basque Media Association - for the development of pilot projects to promote digital transformation in the Basque media. In Zupiria's words: “These projects aim to design future lines of work to stabilise the Basque media in a context that is moving towards digitisation.”

Finally, when asked about the incidents that occurred at a football match this weekend, the spokesperson, Bingen Zupiria, denounced, condemned and rejected all violent action and called for not trivializing violence in society and to work together to eradicate these violent behaviours in sport and other areas. Regarding sports, Zupiria referred to a monitoring system launched four years ago to analyse and promote the values of respect, non-violence and sportsmanship in football. Thanks to this system, sportsmanship has increased in recent years and the sportsmanship index stands at 8.93 points out of 10. Despite this, the spokesman considered it necessary to continue working collaboratively and permanently in this field.