With the “yes” votes of New Democracy and PASOK, the bill Pavlos Marinakis’s bill for the final licensing of regional channels was passed today in Parliament.
SYRIZA, KKE, NIKI and Freedom Course voted against it, while Greek Solution abstained.
With the passage of the bill, the government emphasizes that it puts an end to a peculiar provisional regime that had been in place for 28 years, as regional television stations have operated until now under the status of “legal operation,” without permanent licenses, broadcasting regular programming and participating in the advertising market and state subsidies.
The new framework provides for the first comprehensive licensing process for regional channels, with the process to be conducted exclusively by the National Broadcasting Council and not by the executive branch, as the government emphasized.
At the same time, the auction model established by the Pappas Law is effectively abolished, as licenses will be granted based on qualitative rather than financial criteria, and no fee is required for their acquisition, except for an annual supervision fee payable to the National Broadcasting Council.
The government hopes that the new regulation will bring order to a television landscape that has remained unregulated for decades, enhance transparency, safeguard jobs, and protect legitimate television stations from unfair competition.
Particular emphasis is also placed on staffing, as specific minimum thresholds for employees and journalists per regional zone are being established for the first time, while newly licensed stations will be required to broadcast exclusively in high definition (HD) as part of the transition to the DVB-T2 standard.
The same legislative initiative also incorporated an amendment resolving the issue of recognition of prior service for ERT journalists, ANA-MPA and the General Secretariat for Communication and Information, a provision that was accepted without objection by all political parties.
For the government, the passage of the bill is yet another link in the chain of interventions in the media sector following the Print and Electronic Press Registers and the incorporation of the European Regulation on Media Freedom. For the opposition, however, issues regarding pluralism, diversity of opinion, and the operating conditions of the media remain unresolved.
At the same time, as announced today by the Deputy Minister to the Prime Minister and government spokesperson Pavlos Marinakis, the bill on the licensing of radio stations is next in line.
