Slovak News Back to the news
Abrhan: Culture Ministry's Turn Now to Act on Press Act, Licence Fees
Monday 12 July 2010 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, July 12 (TASR) - It's now up to the Culture Ministry to undertake measures to be included in an amendment to the Press Act and an introduction of fixed payments to state-run media instead of the current practice of licence fees, head of the Parliament's media committee Pavol Abrhan (Christian Democrats/KDH) told TASR on Monday.
Referring to moves that have been announced by the new governing Coalition, Abrhan said that as far as the much-criticised Press Act is concerned, a broad-scale amendment is needed – not just an abolition of the politicians' right to reply.
Turning to the television and radio licence fees, Abrhan said that he supports their scrapping. "I fully back the abolition of licence fees, and the same goes for agreements between the state and the state-run media, and I also support the replacement of the fees by fixed payments from the state budget," said Abrhan, intoning the gist of one of six questions that will appear in a national referendum on September 18.
As the Culture Ministry co-finances the media concerned, via the agreements, this constitutes a conflict of interest whenever the media report on the ministry's activities.
The replacement of the fees will require negotiations with the Finance Ministry, however, as the measure will represent a burden vis-a-vis the state budget, he cautioned.
All rights reserved. Any publishing or further dissemination of press releases and photographs from TASR's resources without TASR's prior written approval constitutes a violation of the Copyrights Act.
