Spain is to end a €30,000 state prize for bullfighting in a move which has angered supporters of the controversial spectacle.
The Ministry of Culture, which has responsibility for bullfighting because it is regarded as an art by aficionados, said on Friday that it was ending the prize to reflect Spain’s changing society.
Spaniards are divided over bullfighting, with some regarding it as an essential part of the country’s culture while others see it as cruel.
The prize, which was started in 2011 under a Socialist government and was first awarded in 2013, gives winners €30,000 (£25,700) from public money, €10,000 more than the state prize for literature.
Leading matadors like Morante de la Puebla, Juan José Padilla and Enrique Ponce have all won the prize in the past.
Ernest Urtasun, the Spanish culture minister, is an avowed opponent of bullfighting who has referred to the spectacle as “unfair, sadistic and despicable”, and proposed repealing the law which protects bullfighting under as part of Spain’s culture and heritage.
“Ending this prize is a faithful reflection of values and feelings of society whose concern for animal welfare has increased,” a Culture Ministry source told eldiario.es, an online newspaper. The ministry said that, according to its data, only 1.9 per cent of the population attended a bullfight between 2021 and 2022.
A statement on the ministry’s website still reads: “In the Spanish legal system, bullfighting is part of the cultural heritage worthy of protection throughout the national territory. As cultural heritage, an obligation is imposed on all public powers to guarantee its conservation and promote its enrichment.”
Aida Gascon, of Animanaturalis, an animal rights group, told i: “Cruelty to animals should not receive prizes. Bullfighting does not do any more than to perpetuate the perverse idea that animals exist for our use and pleasure.”
The news topped the bulletins on RTVE, Spain’s state-run channel.
However, supporters reacted angrily to the end of Spain’s top award for bullfighting.
Victorino Martín president of the Toro de Lidia Foundation, accused Mr Urtasun of “not fulfilling his obligations” as a public official and of exercising his duties in a discriminatory manner against bullfighting “for ideological reasons”. He added: ““If he doesn’t like them [the bulls], it is respectable, but he is not there to do what he likes, but to govern for all Spaniards.”
A statement from the foundation denounced the move and said: “A minister of culture cannot exercise his powers based on his personal preferences, he has the obligation to promote and encourage all cultural manifestations, among which is bullfighting.”
The foundation said it would award this year’s national bullfighting prize itself for as long as such “censorship” continued.
The Foundation for Fighting Bull Breeders said in a message on X: “If it is not the culture of those who [support this move], it is the culture of other people, so by protecting the bulls, we are protecting plurality. The culture belongs to the people.”
Emiliano García-Page, the Socialist president of Castilla de la Mancha, a region in central Spain where bullfighting is popular, reacted to the news by announcing a new prize for the practice.
“This is a symbol of attack to freedom of expression, when the role of the state should be to promote and protect the cultural diversity that characterises our country,” he said.
Animal rights movements have been gaining ground in recent years in Spain, while the number of bullfights has fallen.
In 2007, there were 3,651 corridas de toros (bullfights) but this fell to 1,546 by 2022, according to government statistics.