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PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCASTING IN THE ERA OF AUSTERITY

PETROS IOSIFIDIS

JEAN CHALABY

11 July 2013

GREEK BROADCASTING MARKET

• 1966 launch of EIRT

• Broadcasting’s association with military dictatorship (1967-74)

• 1989 De-facto TV deregulation no consideration re: effects on market structure

• Attempts to regulate market failed due to:

• Introduction of a regulatory regime with vague principles and highly detailed but rarely implemented rules

• ERT from monopoly to just 5% audience share after deregulation!

The ERT Shock!

• 11.06.2011 government shuts ERT!

• 2,650 employees sacked; 5 TV channels, 29 radio stations, several websites, symphony orchestra – closed overnight…

• … as part of the latest public spending cuts imposed to meet the terms of the country’s bailout deal

• Rationale ERT was overstaffed and inefficient…massive salaries & bonuses paid to presenters, managers, senior executives…

ERT – “haven of waste”?

• Simos Kedikoglou, spokesman and deputy-minister responsible for the media, characterised ERT as a “typical example of unique lack of transparency” and “haven of waste” and announced the setting up (at an unspecified time) of a new more efficient public service broadcaster.

• 17 June Council of State rules for the immediate enactment of all frequencies until a new PSB is established.

• But, it was ignored by government; new body to be established in autumn 2013, leaving the country without a PSB service and its employees facing an uncertain future.

• The Democratic Left, a partner of the fragile governing coalition, resisted the move and has since left the government.

Was the government right in closing down ERT?

• The short answer is no!

• True, both traditional political parties, PASOK and New Democracy, have long given jobs at ERT as prizes to loyal supporters (but also other public sector posts, totalling 970,000 in 2009, when the civil service constituted nearly a third of Greece’s workforce!)

• Meanwhile, some ERT journalists, top presenters, managers and ‘senior executives’ were being paid fat salaries and scandalous bonuses which did not up ERT’s ratings but contributed to its financial bloodshed.

‘State’ or ‘public service’ broadcaster?

• ERT has for many decades been a ‘state’ broadcaster, close to the government of the day, rather than a politically & financially independent ‘public service’ broadcaster.

• But this changed in more recent years (1997 restructuring: ET1; NET; ERT3) and the organisation has become more impartial.

• Also, its programming is leaning more toward information (than entertainment) and, in contrast to the main commercial broadcasters that feed Greeks the relentless diet of infotainment, soap operas and game shows, it offers a great deal of cultural and educational programming and it also supports two symphony orchestras.

ERT’s role today

• ERT’s role as an impartial PSB is important especially today given the rise in social tension and the rise of the far right in Greece.

• It is not acceptable to close down a public broadcaster without consultation and sack its employees, just to justify the wishes of the ‘troika’ (IMF/EC/ECB) for redundancies in the public sector.

• The closure of ERT is an attack on free speech and public space by the Greek government.

Sum up

• ERT requires restructuring and an array of reforms (reduction in the number of high-level directors; removal of duplicate services; more autonomy among different divisions), but this should be done under a strategic plan and after consultation with interested parties.

• It is a dangerous precedent to close down PSB entirely or even to link PSB reform to austerity.

• Greece is not the only country undergoing austerity measures and looking to cut public spending…

• …and while some slimming of budgets is unavoidable, we need to consider carefully the position of PSB in these conditions and prevent such arbitrary axing becoming a trend.