On 9 May, an overwhelming majority of MEPs adopted an own-initiative report on the implementation of the revised Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) .

Wouter Gekiere, Head of the EBU’s Brussels Office said: “Today, the European Parliament recognized the importance of media services of general interest, including of course public service media, and has urged Member States to make use of the provisions of the revised AVMSD to ensure that audiences can easily find these services.”

He continued: “Most importantly, the European Parliament opens the door to creating a binding obligation at EU level so that Member States must ensure prominence of general interest media services, considering the latest technological advances and market trends, we could not agree more with the Members of European Parliament. This idea could best be translated into action by including ambitious prominence rules in the European Media Freedom Act.”

In the report, the European Parliament also takes a strong stance on:

• encouraging Member States to adopt comprehensive and effective rules to protect the integrity of audiovisual media services on all relevant online platforms and interfaces used to access audiovisual media services; calling for appropriate measures to ensure that audiovisual media service providers can access all data relating to the use of their services; 
• stressing the need to ensure a consistent legal framework within which sector-specific law (i.e. the AVMSD) prevails over horizontal rules (i.e. the DSA);   
• Recognizing an open and broad definition of "European works" that should only be evaluated on the basis of scientific findings. 

The EBU and its Members will continue to work closely with policymakers and regulators, both at the European and national levels, to ensure that the revised AVMSD is effectively implemented.

The AVMSD is a European landmark legislation regulating certain aspects of the provision of linear and non-linear audiovisual media services, including of public service media organizations, as well as video-sharing platform services. The revised AVMSD was adopted by the European co-legislators in 2018. Member States had 2 years to transpose the new rules into national law and in several countries, this took much longer. Against this background, the European Parliament's own-initiative report gives new impetus to issues that are of fundamental importance for media service providers, in particular public service media organizations.