Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-12-12-Speech-2-186"
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"en.20061212.40.2-186"2
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Madam President, honourable Members, ladies and gentlemen, I would thank all those in this House who have worked on the proposal for a directive on the various audiovisual media services. I should like, in particular, to congratulate the rapporteur, Mrs Hieronymi, as well as the co-rapporteurs and the shadow rapporteurs who have put a lot of time and energy into drawing up Parliament’s opinion.
Where the rules are concerned, audiovisual content in the first category – that is to say, traditional radio and television broadcasting – needs to be subjected to a set of rules comparable to the current rules, but updated and simplified in order to take account of the developments I have mentioned. In the case, moreover, of audiovisual content in the second category, recourse to the country of origin principle should be authorised, on condition that the harmonised basic rules relating, in particular, to the protection of minors and the ban on incitement to racial hatred are complied with.
We then need to lower the barriers to entering the audiovisual sector by simplifying the current rules, particularly in the area of commercial communications, and to do so without compromising the general interest.
Madam President, I am very aware of the fact that many Members are very sensitive about this subject and that a number of them are asking for stricter rules on advertising. I want to be very clear about this issue. Like yourselves, I do not want to see American-style television, that is to say programmes constantly interrupted by isolated advertising spots. That is why the Commission is reaffirming the limit of a maximum of 12 minutes per hour and maintaining the principle of exception for isolated advertising spots, except in the case of sport. At the same time, we must bear in mind that, to put it bluntly, television channels, whether they be publicly or privately owned, need advertising revenue in order to buy high-quality content such as sport, films and documentaries. If we want Europeans still to be able to have a choice between free—to—air-television and pay TV, we must accept that there is going to be advertising.
What is more, recourse to co-regulation and self-regulation needs to be encouraged as a supplementary means of implementing the directive. This is the first time that this option has been introduced into a legislative text. There is also cause for reaffirming the general interest when it comes to the protection of children against harmful content, the protection of human dignity and the consumer’s right to transparency, as well as the promotion of European works, which are an expression of our cultural diversity.
Honourable Members, you have today the opportunity, while still making stringent ethical demands, to enable the very successful European audiovisual content industry to become still more competitive and more integrated into the European internal market. I would ask you, in the course of the debate and the voting, to seize the opportunity to send two messages: one to Europeans, encouraging them to embrace new developments in television, and another to the professional sector, encouraging it to invest not only in order to create value but also in order that tomorrow’s creative content might be European. It will only be possible to achieve this if the legal framework is better adapted to 21st century television. The Commission is inspired solely by these considerations in examining Parliament’s amendments.
Madam President, I shall have the opportunity at the end of the debate to explain the Commission’s position on the amendments in greater detail. Thank you for your attention. I am able to tell you right now that the Commission intends to accept a very large number of the amendments tabled by the rapporteur.
Their efforts have been rewarded, as a number of the amendments that we are examining today improve the Commission’s initial proposal, presented on 13 December 2005. I also wish to emphasise the excellent cooperation between Parliament, my services and the Council, whose Finnish Presidency has done a first-class job.
The proposal for a directive on audiovisual media, which updates the TV Without Frontiers Directive, will be seen as one of the important pieces of legislation adopted in the course of this Parliamentary term. It responds to two requirements: firstly, it enables us to adapt our audiovisual enterprises to the considerable technological and commercial developments that have taken place; and, secondly, it demonstrates the political will that exists to ensure the continuation of the values essential to our communal life and to the forming of public opinion.
On the one hand, the technical and commercial aspects have to be taken into consideration. There are the new means of watching television, such as Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) and video on demand (VOD), the shift to digital technologies offering many more services and the arrival of new players in the market, including telecommunications companies, Internet access providers and big international investors. On the other hand, account needs to be taken of cherished considerations such as consumer protection, human dignity, the protection of minors and the promotion of cultural diversity and of media pluralism.
What is more, the Commission proposal will enable all companies that want to invest in the audiovisual media to do so under fair conditions of competition and at European level, namely that of the internal market. The principle on which the 1989 directive is based has not been substantially changed and is still that underpinning the updated directive. According to this principle, full compliance with the free movement of services in the internal market is conditional on responding only to the legislation of the country of establishment.
I would thank Parliament for supporting me in the matter of this basic demand, which contributes not only to the strength of our audiovisual industry but also, by opening national markets to European competition, to media pluralism.
The essential points of the Commission proposal are as follows. Firstly, the directive should be made applicable to audiovisual media services, with a definition of these services that is sufficiently flexible to stand the test of time while remaining sufficiently precise to provide the sector with the legal certainty it needs. Secondly, the various services should be divided, or grouped, into two categories reflecting the twofold differentiation criterion of, on the one hand, users’ choice and control, and, on the other, the impact of these services on the way in which public opinion is formed.
Linear services, which constitute the first group, correspond to television broadcasting involving a chronological sequence of programmes. Such services are ‘push’ content, whether the platform is traditional, IPTV or mobile television.
The other group – non-linear services – are supplied at the consumer’s request. These services – video on demand, for example - are ‘pull’ content, selected from a catalogue."@en1
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