Knesset gives first reading to bill to abolish public broadcasting

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Minister of Communications Shlomo Karhi: The Corporation’s news broadcasting is otiose, biased, and expresses an imagined reality. Yair Lapid: The bill is a threat to democracy.

Today, the Knesset gave a first reading to the bill sponsored by MK Tally Gotliv (Likud) and adopted by the ministerial legislation committee to privatize the Israel Public Broadcasting Corporation, which broadcasts as Kan. The vote was 49 members of Knesset in favor and 46 against.

Minister of Communications Shlomo Karhi said in the debate, "There is no need for the public to finance public broadcasting," and that "the Corporation’s news and current affairs broadcasting is otiose, biased, and expresses an imagined reality."

Leader of the Opposition Yair Lapid said that Karhi and Gotliv had decided to eradicate the free media, and then to deal with all the rest. He described the bill as a threat to democracy, and called on Israeli media to oppose it, "because it’s on its way to you."

Under the bill, the Israel Public Broadcasting Corporation will be shut down within two years. The law that governed its activity will be repealed. The Second Authority for Television and Radio will publish a tender to select a licensee for television broadcasts on the channels which the Public Broadcasting Corporation uses. If a winner is chosen, it will be licensed for private, commercial broadcasting. If no winner is chosen, "the Public Broadcasting Corporation will cease to broadcast and will cease all activity connected to broadcasting within two years of this law coming into force." The bill proposes the same treatment for the Public Broadcasting Corporation’s radio broadcasts, and a tender will be held for the Corporation’s Reshet Bet news and current affairs station with the aim of privatizing it.

The ministerial legislation committee adopted the bill despite the objections of the Attorney General’s Office, which stated in alegal opinion submitted to the committee, "A decision cannot be made to erase from the communications field a main platform for expression hastily, in a private member’s bill, with no professional basis, and contrary to the way in which the government has acted on this matter in the past. This is a matter of great public importance, which up to now has been examined as part of government staff work that included the activity of a series of public committees appointed by the government to examine the matter." The opnion added, ""Ending the news and current affairs broadcasts of the Corporation has a clearly negative effect on the range of opinion in the Israeli marketplace of ideas."

Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on November 27, 2024.

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