What do the parties in Saxony say on culture and media?

The AfD wants more money for preserving monuments, especially for private owners, and wants to support local heritage and customs. It opposes what it sees as an ideological slant in the cultural sector. Protection of the German language would be written into the state constitution.

The AfD wants to spend more on old buildings and monuments. It wants to support customs and local culture. Museums should not rename artworks. The German language should be in Saxony's constitution.

The AfD wants to terminate the interstate treaties on media and broadcast funding and fundamentally overhaul the MDR (the regional public broadcaster). No one should have to pay for a broadcasting service they do not use. The party considers public broadcasting insufficiently balanced and independent of the state.

The AfD wants to cancel the treaties on public broadcasting. No one should have to pay the broadcasting fee anymore. It wants to change the broadcaster MDR a lot. Parties should disclose their shares in media companies.

The BSW wants to fundamentally rework Saxony's Kulturraumgesetz (cultural regions law) to secure lasting funding for theaters, orchestras and other cultural institutions. The party warns of insolvencies because the cultural regions can no longer carry the funding alone. Sociocultural centers are also to be protected.

In Saxony, the cultural regions law sets how culture is paid for. The BSW wants to change this law a lot. Theaters and orchestras should get secure funding. So should museums, libraries and cultural centers. The party warns that venues could go bankrupt otherwise.

The BSW wants freelance artists to be able to earn a living income. Regular public commissions and simple funding programs are meant to help. Cultural funding should not be tied to political declarations.

The BSW wants to give more support to independent artists. They should be able to live from their work. The state should give them regular commissions. Funding should be easy to apply for. Nobody should have to make a political statement to get funding.

The BSW wants to give children and young people early access to all the arts. State and municipal museums are to be free of charge up to age 18. In rural areas, travel to theaters, concerts and museums is to be paid for.

The BSW wants more culture for children and young people. Museum entry should be free up to age 18. Children in rural areas should get their trip to the theater paid. The same goes for trips to concerts and museums. Theaters and museums should work with schools.

The BSW rejects raising the public broadcasting fee and wants the state parliament to set up a commission of inquiry on public broadcasters. It would examine whether their reporting is objective and independent of the government. The platform points to declining trust in these media.

The BSW does not want a higher broadcasting fee. The state parliament should set up a commission. It should check the reporting of public broadcasters. The BSW thinks some reporting is one-sided.

The BSW wants to give the Sorbian people extensive self-determination in culture and education. It justifies this with the threat to the Sorbian language and culture, which UNESCO has also noted.

The Sorbs are a minority group in Saxony. Their language is at risk. The BSW wants the Sorbs to decide on culture and education themselves. The BSW also wants to support Sorbian associations.

The BSW wants high-quality cultural offerings to take place outside the big urban centers too. The Kulturräume, Saxony's regional associations for funding culture, are to receive additional money for this.

There should be good culture in the countryside too. Fewer visitors come there. So the Kulturräume should get more money. Kulturräume are associations that pay for culture in Saxony.

The CDU wants to strengthen the culture of remembrance in Saxony and continue examining the GDR, which it calls a state of injustice, including through a dedicated university chair. It also plans a permanent "Zukunftsdialog Heimat.Sachsen" forum and an exchange program between eastern and western German municipalities.

The CDU wants Saxony to remember its history. The time of East Germany should be studied further. A special professorship should be created for that. Towns in East and West should exchange more.

The CDU wants to permanently guarantee the existing institutions for expellees and Spätaussiedler (ethnic German resettlers from Eastern Europe) and keep their culture and history alive as part of German history. Resettlers are to be fully integrated socially and into society.

The CDU wants to keep the institutions for expellees and resettlers. Resettlers are people of German descent from Eastern Europe. Their culture and history should stay alive. They should settle in well in Saxony.

The CDU wants to write protection of Saxony's World Heritage sites explicitly into the state's heritage protection act. This is meant to prevent individual measures from jointly endangering a World Heritage title.

Saxony has places that are World Heritage sites. The CDU wants to protect them by law. The protection should be written into the heritage protection act. That way no place should lose its World Heritage title.

The CDU wants to preserve Saxony's cultural landscape and reliably secure its funding in cities and rural areas. To that end, the Kulturraumgesetz (Cultural Areas Act) is to be rewritten and a future plan for culture drawn up with the municipalities. The focus is on orchestras, theaters, museums and libraries.

The CDU wants to keep culture alive across Saxony. Theaters, orchestras, museums and libraries should get enough money. This applies to cities and villages. An important law on this will be rewritten. The state makes a plan for the future with the towns.

The CDU wants to continue and expand broad cultural funding in Saxony, from the state cultural foundation to music schools, festivals and clubs. Culture should be accessible and barrier-free in every region, and cultural heritage should be preserved and protected.

The CDU wants to keep funding culture all over Saxony. This includes music schools, festivals, libraries and clubs. Rural areas should have cultural events too. Everyone should be able to take part. Art treasures should be well protected.

The CDU wants to implement the development plan of the Saxon Memorials Foundation and fund the foundation adequately. It also plans a "Year of Jewish Culture in Saxony" and a state exhibition marking 1,100 years of Saxony.

The CDU wants to strengthen memorial sites in Saxony. Memorial sites remember victims of political violence. The foundation that runs them should get enough money. There will be a Year of Jewish Culture. In 2029 there will be a big exhibition about Saxony.

The CDU supports public broadcasting but sees a need for far-reaching reform of its remit and structures. The license fee should stay stable, and the remit should focus on information, education, advice and culture. The party rejects an index model, meaning automatic adjustment of the fee.

The CDU thinks the public broadcasters ARD, ZDF and Deutschlandradio are important. But it wants to change them. The license fee should not go up. The broadcasters should mainly inform and educate. They should spend less on sports and entertainment. Parliaments should decide on the fee.

The CDU wants local journalism such as daily newspapers, free weeklies and local broadcasting to be available everywhere in Saxony. It wants to keep the local journalism funding that is paid out at arm's length from the state, and at the federal level it backs a delivery subsidy and lower VAT on press products.

The CDU wants to keep local newspapers and local stations. People everywhere in Saxony should get news from their own area. Funding for this should continue. The state should not decide on the content. Newspapers should pay less sales tax.

The CDU wants to bring the differing rules for press, broadcasting and online services closer together. Private broadcasters and local TV should have fair conditions when competing with non-European platforms. To that end, the advertising rules in the Interstate Media Treaty are to be revised.

Newspapers, broadcasters and internet platforms follow different rules today. The CDU wants to make these rules more alike. Private stations should have a fair chance against big platforms. The rules for advertising should be checked again.

The CDU wants to keep strengthening media literacy in Saxony's school curricula and expand media education for all age groups. It cites complex news situations, false reports and AI-generated fake images, audio and video as the reason.

People should learn how to handle media well. This should stay important in school. Adults and older people should get offers too. The reason is false news and fake pictures and videos.

The CDU wants to establish Saxony firmly as an international media and film location and strengthen training for skilled workers in the sector. Movie theaters should be preserved, and the creative industries, esports and gaming should get more weight in economic policy.

The CDU wants more films and media to be made in Saxony. There should be good training for this. Movie theaters should stay, also in rural areas. The CDU sees video games and esports as important industries for the future.

The CDU wants to preserve and further develop the Sorbian language and culture, pointing to the mandate in the state constitution. Language programs in daycare and schools, teacher training and bilingualism in public spaces are to be expanded.

The Sorbs are a minority in Saxony with their own language. The CDU wants to keep this language and culture alive. Children should be able to learn Sorbian in daycare and school. This needs more Sorbian teachers. Signs and services should be bilingual more often.

The Free Voters want to preserve cultural monuments and institutions and make admission to Saxony's museums free. Volunteer work would be rewarded with pension credits. In sports, the party calls for more programs for children and young people, planning certainty for associations, and keeping politics out of sports.

The Free Voters want to keep old buildings, theaters, and museums. Museums in Saxony should be free to enter. People who volunteer should get a higher pension for it. There should be more sports for children and young people. Sports should be free of politics.

The Free Voters want to reduce the number of public TV and radio stations to save money. The broadcasters' mandate and their supervisory councils are also to be reviewed and reformed. The party expects more detachment in news coverage.

The Free Voters want fewer public TV and radio stations. This is meant to save money. The party also wants to change how the stations are supervised. Journalists should report in a neutral way.

The Greens want to revise Saxony's Sorbs Act. Sorbian language and culture are to be promoted not only in the traditional settlement area but across Saxony, because Sorbs live throughout the state. Sorbian schools are to be protected and strengthened.

The Sorbs are a minority in Saxony with their own language. The Greens want to protect their language and culture better. A law on this should be updated. Children all over Saxony should be able to learn Sorbian. There should be more signs and information in two languages.

The Greens want cultural workers to be paid fairly, both in theaters and orchestras and as solo freelancers in other fields. To that end, binding minimum fees are to apply in cultural funding.

The Greens want fair pay for people who work in culture. This applies to employees and to freelancers. Anyone who gets public funding should pay a minimum fee. A fee is the payment a freelancer gets.

The Greens want to develop the Kulturraumgesetz (Saxony's law on regional cultural funding) so that cultural offerings stay accessible across the state. State funds are to rise regularly and be reliably plannable. Funding programs are to become simpler and more transparent.

The Greens want to secure culture all over Saxony. The state should give more money for it on a regular basis. Theaters and orchestras should stay. New cultural groups should get a chance too. Applying for funding should become easier.

The Greens want everyone to have access to artistic and creative activity regardless of income. To achieve this, the ministries are to draw up a joint funding strategy, and a statewide coordination office is to be set up.

The Greens want all children to be able to make art and music. This should not depend on their parents' money. Music schools should get more support. There should be more art schools for young people. A new office should coordinate everything in the state.

The Greens want to recognize clubs as cultural venues and grant them grandfathered protection. The platform regards club culture, pop music, and open-air events as an important part of the cultural scene.

The Greens see clubs as places of culture. Clubs should get special protection. This should keep them from being pushed out. The state should pay for soundproofing. There should be one central contact office for pop music.

The Greens want an ecological overhaul of the cultural sector and plan a dedicated funding program for it. Cultural funding is to be tied to energy efficiency, climate neutrality, and careful use of resources.

The Greens want culture to do less harm to the climate. There should be a new funding program for this. Cultural buildings should be built and renovated to be climate-neutral. A contact office should advise cultural institutions.

The Greens want to turn public libraries into places for learning information and media skills and to give museums better support. Sociocultural centers are to be preserved statewide and funded on a permanent basis.

The Greens want to turn libraries into modern places of learning. People should learn there how to handle media. Small museums should get more help. Sociocultural centers should stay all over the state. These are neighborhood houses for culture and meeting people.

The Greens want museums, collections, and libraries to treat research into the origins of their holdings from colonial, Nazi, and East German contexts as a core task. The party commits to returning collection items and human remains.

Museums should check where their objects come from. Some objects come from injustice, such as colonial times or the Nazi era. The Greens want to give such objects back. Human remains should also go back to the descendants.

The Greens want reliable funding for the Stiftung Sächsische Gedenkstätten (Saxon Memorials Foundation) and new places of learning and encounter. The Sachsenburg and Hoheneck memorials are to come under the foundation, and new themes such as colonial history and the NSU are to be added.

The Greens want to strengthen the memory of history. The memorials foundation should get reliable funding. Two new memorial sites should belong to the foundation. There should be a center about the NSU. The NSU was a far-right terror group.

The Greens want to strengthen local reporting because, in the platform's view, concentration in the media market is degrading the information on offer. Community media, film festivals, and art-house cinemas are to be secured, and the state media authority is to become more broadly based.

The Greens want more news from the local area. Local papers and stations should get support. Community media should grow across the state. These are stations where citizens make the programs themselves. Cinemas and film festivals in rural areas should stay.

The Greens want public broadcasting funded at the level its mandate requires. The broadcasters are to offer programming for all groups in society and build a joint digital platform.

The Greens want to give public broadcasters enough money. The stations should make programs for all groups. They should build a shared online platform. It should be able to compete with private platforms.

The Left wants more money for the Kulturräume (regional cultural funding districts) to secure cultural institutions in rural areas. Village meeting places, fire departments, sports clubs and youth work should also get more support.

The Left wants more money for culture in rural areas. Theaters and museums should stay there. Villages should get meeting places, such as a shop with a café. Young people should have their own spaces. Fire departments and sports clubs should also get more help.

The Left wants to protect Sorbian identity. Sorbian is to be expanded as a second official language and be learnable everywhere in Saxony, and Sorbian history is to be taught in schools.

The Sorbs are a minority in Saxony. The Left wants to protect their language and culture. People should be able to learn Sorbian everywhere in Saxony. Schools should teach Sorbian history.

The Left regards culture as an essential public service and wants to fund municipalities and the Kulturräume (regional culture funding districts) so they can maintain and develop the cultural landscape. Funding is to rise automatically with wages and prices. Culture should be within reach for everyone, regardless of money or where they live.

The Left wants more money for culture in cities and villages. The money should rise each year with prices. Everyone should be able to enjoy culture. Clubs should also get protection and funding.

The Left wants to introduce binding minimum fees for freelance artists and pay permanent staff at cultural institutions according to collective agreements. The platform argues that many people working in arts and culture can barely live on their work.

Many artists earn very little. The Left wants fixed minimum fees for freelance artists. Staff at theaters and museums should get union-scale pay. Everyone should be able to live on their work.

The Left wants to make cultural offerings easier to access, for example through free admission, and to keep and fund music schools and youth art schools. Parents are to get financial relief for their children's cultural education. Music teachers are to be paid better.

The Left wants everyone to be able to enjoy culture. For example, admission could be free. Music schools and art schools for young people should stay. Parents should pay less for them. Music teachers should earn more.

The Left wants to hand unused buildings and land owned by the state and municipalities to cultural initiatives. Important industrial monuments are to be preserved and, where possible, used as social and cultural spaces. The platform argues that projects often simply lack a suitable space.

Some buildings owned by the state and towns stand empty. The Left wants to give them to culture groups. Old factory buildings should be kept. They should become places for culture and meeting people.

The Left wants to fund the Foundation for the Sorbian People and other Sorbian organizations according to need. The financing agreement between Saxony, Brandenburg and the federal government is to run without a time limit and compensate for inflation.

The Sorbs are a minority in Saxony. The Left wants to fund their foundation permanently. The contract for this should have no end date. The money should rise with prices.

The Left wants to reorient Saxony's remembrance policy and make the uniqueness of Nazi crimes and the Shoah its guiding principle. It considers it unhistorical that the memorials law equates remembrance of Nazi crimes with remembrance of the victims of Stalinism. Memorial sites are to get more money and specialist staff.

The Left wants to change how Saxony remembers the Nazi era. The Nazi crimes should be treated as unique. Memorial sites should get more money. They should be able to hire more education experts.

The Left wants to research and address Saxony's involvement in colonialism and create a dedicated place of remembrance. Checking the origin of collection items from colonial contexts is to become easier. People affected by racism are to be involved.

Saxony was also involved in colonialism. The Left wants to research this history. There should be a place of remembrance. Museums should find it easier to check where their items come from.

The Left wants to preserve a diverse media landscape in Saxony and prevent further concentration. Local reporting is to be secured and media subsidies awarded more transparently. In the party's view, media policy should deal with all media, including private companies.

The Left wants many different media outlets in Saxony. A few big companies should not control everything. There should still be news from each region. It should be clear who gets funding for media.

The Left wants to preserve non-commercial community radio and local and regional radio and TV stations, which it sees as important for media diversity. Saxony's state media authority is also to review media providers' output regularly, and its assembly is to gain more rights.

The Left wants to keep small local radio and TV stations. This includes community radio without ads. Every county should have such stations. A public agency should check how well the stations work.

The Left wants the state of Saxony to put more money into Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung, the regional film and media fund. It also wants cinema to become a cultural venue again in every region.

The Left wants to give more money to support films. People in smaller towns should also be able to see movies regularly. This should happen within five years.

The Left wants public broadcasting to keep a comprehensive mandate that also covers entertainment, feature films and sports. At the same time, broadcasters are to become more transparent and the MDR broadcasting council more diverse, which the platform says is needed to regain public acceptance.

The Left wants strong public broadcasting. The broadcaster MDR should not only show news. It should also show films, sports and programs for children. Broadcasters should work more openly. More different groups should sit on the broadcasting council.

The Left wants to keep the broadcasting fee as a solidarity-based way of funding public broadcasting. People who receive welfare benefits are to be exempt as a rule, and the state is to cover the cost of those exemptions.

The Left wants to keep the broadcasting fee. People who get welfare benefits should not have to pay it. The state should cover the cost. Then the fee can go down a little for everyone.

The SPD wants to reform the Sorbs Act and the Foundation for the Sorbian People together with the Sorbs, with an eye to their rights to participation and self-determination. Sorbian language, history and culture are to be promoted, starting in daycare.

The Sorbs are a minority in Saxony. The SPD wants to update the law for the Sorbs. The Sorbs should have a say in this. More children should learn Sorbian in daycare.

The SPD wants to introduce fee guidelines and minimum standards in arts funding to improve working conditions for creative professionals and the solo self-employed. The Kulturraumgesetz (Saxony's law on regional arts funding) is to be revised so that arts funding can be planned over several years.

The SPD wants fair pay in the arts. There should be rules for fees. A fee is the pay for self-employed people. Arts institutions should be able to plan for several years. State money should only go to those who pay union-level wages.

The SPD wants to make Saxony a leader in educational work at memorial sites and with eyewitnesses to history. Funding for the Saxon Memorials Foundation is to increase.

The SPD wants to strengthen the memory of history. Memorial sites should do modern educational work. The foundation for memorial sites should get more money. This gives helpers more support.

The SPD wants to fundamentally restructure Saxony's state media authority and give its media assembly more decision-making powers. Public broadcasting is to be developed further, with a focus on information, education and culture.

The SPD wants to change the state media authority. It oversees private broadcasters in Saxony. The media assembly should have more say. Local media should keep getting money. Public broadcasters should mainly inform and educate.

The SPD wants to preserve the language and culture of the Sorbs for future generations. Knowledge of Sorbian is to count as a plus in suitable selection procedures, and bilingualism is to become more visible.

The Sorbs are a minority in Saxony. The SPD wants to protect their language and culture. People who speak Sorbian should have an advantage in some selection procedures. Town signs should show two languages. Public information should also be available in Sorbian.