Ombudsman reprimands SRF moderation on No Billag initiative
Formal deficiencies in the moderation of a Radio SRF program on the No Billag initiative: This is the complaint of SRG ombudsman Roger Blum in a final report. The moderator's statements were not correct, as they were not in the text of the initiative.
Under scrutiny was the "Medientalk" program on Radio SRF 4 News on September 23, in which the presenter discussed the initiative with two media journalists. Afterwards, a listener objected to the moderation of the program and criticized "some false statements" about the consequences of accepting the initiative. The moderator said that public media - radio, television, Internet or print - would henceforth become impossible. It is not possible today to estimate how the laws would be structured after a possible adoption of the initiative, the complainant pointed out.
Blum supports the criticism in his final report on the case published Tuesday. In fact, the initiative does not prohibit either the cantons or the municipalities from financing radio and television. But this would not be in line with the spirit of the initiative. The initiative text of "No Billag" only talks about the federal government.
"The initiative wants media - and all media - to function solely according to the laws of the market. It therefore puts an end to most of what has so far been part of the federal media order," Blum writes. After the adoption of the initiative, the new media order could in fact look like the one outlined by the moderator in his closing remarks. Formally, however, these statements are not correct.
Finally, Blum points out that it is not accurate to speak of public media in Switzerland. The SRG is an association under private law and the other radio and television providers are certainly not under public law. Therefore, one should speak of fee-financed media. (SDA)
Photo: SRG
