Summary
The structure of media ownership should be transparent.
Obligations
Election Parts
Criteria
Quotes
- Transparency of media ownership is necessary in order to control media concentration, to prevent the media from being in the hands of a few and to enable pluralism of media ownership.
- Where media is owned by political parties or politicians, member states should ensure that this is made transparent to the public.
- Members of the public should have access on an equitable and impartial basis to certain basic information on the media so as to enable them to form an opinion on the value to be given to information, ideas, and opinions disseminated by the media.
- The adoption and effective implementation of mediaownership regulation also plays an important role in this respect. Such regulation should ensure transparency in media ownership and prevent its concentration where this is detrimental to pluralism. It should address issues such as indirect and cross-media ownership, and appropriate restrictions on media ownership by persons holding public office.
- Transparency in regard to application for the exploitation of broadcasting services may be guaranteed by including provisions in national legislation obliging applicants for the operation of a radio or television broadcasting service to provide the service or the authority empowered to authorise the operation of the service with information which is fairly wide-ranging in its scope and quite precise in its content. the information which may be subject to disclosure may be schematically grouped into three categories: first category: information concerning the persons or bodies participating in the structure which is to operate the service and on the nature and the extent of the respective participation of these persons or bodies in the structure concerned; second category: information on the nature and the extent of the interests held by the above persons and bodies in other media or in media enterprises, even in other economic sectors; third category: information on other persons or bodies likely to exercise a significant influence on the programming policy of this service by the provision of certain kinds of resources, the nature of which should be clearly specified in the licensing procedures, to the service or to the persons or bodies involved in the latter's operations.
- Encouragement should be given by public authorities or, as appropriate, by those engaged in the practice of journalism, to: d) transparency in regard to: the ownership structures of the various media enterprises and the relationships with third parties who have influence on the editorial independence of media.
- States are furthermore encouraged to ensure procedures to prevent media mergers or acquisitions that could adversely affect the pluralism of media ownership or diversity of media content.
- States should promote a regime of transparency of media ownership that ensures the public availability and accessibility of accurate, up-to-date data concerning direct and beneficial ownership of the media, as well as other interests that influence the strategic decision making of the media in question or its editorial line.
- High levels of transparency should also be ensured with regard to the sources of financing of media outlets in order to provide a comprehensive picture of the different sources of potential interference with the editorial and operational independence of the media and allow for effective monitoring and controlling of such risks.
- Accordingly, the Assembly calls on member States to review, where necessary, their regulatory frameworks governing media coverage of election campaigns, in order to bring them into line with Council of Europe standards, ensuring in particular that they: (...) 8.2. avoid media concentration, also paying attention to the problem of cross ownership.
- Accordingly, the Assembly calls on member States to review, where necessary, their regulatory frameworks governing media coverage of election campaigns, in order to bring them into line with Council of Europe standards, ensuring in particular that they: (...) 8.9. ensure total transparency with regard to the public when media are owned by political parties or politicians.
- The obligations to promote the enjoyment of the right to freedom of opinion and expression require that States guarantee the transparency of all aspects of political and electoral processes, and should particularly put in place measures to: (...) (e) Promote transparency of media ownership, making public the identity of the owners and how it might reflect their persuasions or biases.
- Transparency should be a hallmark of public policy efforts in the area of broadcasting. This should apply to regulation, ownership, public subsidy schemes and other policy initiatives.
- States should establish legal frameworks that ensure transparency about media ownership and their potential influence over the political process. (...) Relevant disclosures about media ownership and consolidation provide the public with information about possible sources of economic and political influence and bias in the media.
- States should require media outlets, both legacy and digital, to make public information about their ownership, in accordance with principles of non-discrimination and the threepart test.
- States should put in place a range of measures, including those highlighted in our Joint Declaration of 12 December 2007, to create an environment in which a pluralistic media sector can flourish. These should include, among others, obligations of transparency of media ownership, licensing of different types of broadcasters to promote diversity, rules to prevent undue concentration of media ownership and measures to promote content diversity among and within media outlets.