NKÚ: The Ministry of Culture provided grants in a complicated and ineffective manner

Prague - The Ministry of Culture (MK) distributed funds for cultural activities between 2016 and 2018 in a complicated, inefficient, and non-transparent manner; support was fragmented and, due to a lack of an information system, was challenging for both providers and recipients. Based on an audit of this matter, the Supreme Audit Office (NKÚ) today informed. Although the MK promised to address these issues following a previous audit five years ago, deficiencies persisted. The Ministry of Culture claims that from this year onwards there is a ministerial directive that unified and detailed the grant system, significantly reducing fragmentation, complexity, administrative burden, and inefficiency in grant selection procedures.

The Ministry of Culture provided approximately 500 to 600 million crowns each year for activities such as dance, theater, literature, music, film, and visual arts. "The audit has shown that the distribution of this support is fragmented. Also, due to the lack of an information system, it is challenging for both providers and recipients, and ultimately inefficient," stated the audit office. According to the NKÚ, the ministry also distributed money in a non-transparent manner, as it supported projects outside the selection process.

Deficiencies were also found by auditors with some recipients, for example, the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival, whose organizers received the highest annual support - 30 million crowns.

At that time, nine departments of the ministry were responsible for allocating grants, which acted differently and did not coordinate their procedures, the NKÚ discovered. One of the reasons for the complicated distribution of support was that the Ministry of Culture did not have an information system for providing it, despite committing to this after the NKÚ audit in 2014.

In addition, auditors claim that the ministry proceeded non-transparently in distributing support. Each year, the amount of money allocated without tenders increased, even though there were no objective reasons for their allocation. Between 2011 and 2013, more than 68 million crowns were distributed in this manner, while from 2016 to 2018, it was over 112 million crowns. At the same time, the ministry did not adequately check the applicants and allocated support even to those who did not meet the requirements.

For example, the organizer of the Karlovy Vary Film Festival prepared two versions of the settlement every year from 2013 to 2017 - in the first one, it reported a profit, while in the corrected version, it reported a loss; however, the Ministry of Culture accepted the settlement without reservations for several consecutive years and allocated the funding requested by this applicant, amounting to tens of millions of crowns. A significant portion of this money was supposed to be returned to the budget by the festival organizers, which the ministry did not require, said the auditors.

"All of these deficiencies are long-standing, and the MK had committed to rectify many of them following the previous NKÚ audit in 2014. However, almost nothing has improved," concluded the audit office.

The spokesperson for the Ministry of Culture, Martha Häckl, informed ČTK today that as early as the beginning of 2015, the MK began systematic changes aimed at greater transparency. New and comparable criteria were established, and score and verbal evaluations of projects were introduced. "This year, an internal regulation came into effect, which comprehensively regulates the area of ministry grants in accordance with current legislation, and soon this entire system will be converted into an electronic format," added the spokesperson.