Today, the European Commission published important proposals to strengthen the sustainability and resilience of free media in Europe, stressing the critical role of professional media in helping citizens make free and informed choices.

The democracy shield rightly recognises the strong economic pressures media face in digital markets, together with the risks that AI technology creates for the availability of plural and quality information.

To address these concerns, the Commission proposes to review EU digital, competition and copyright rules to create fair market conditions for media. This shows a good understanding of the underlying problems faced by media.

The proposed solutions are generally good but need to be more ambitious. The EU must seize this opportunity to harness the power of advertising markets and promote investments in responsible media, rather than allow billions of advertising euros to end in the hands of foreign tech platform, which are used to spread disinformation and other types of harmful and illegal content.

Going forward, improving market conditions should come before increases in public funding, which risk compromising the independence of free media from public and state actors in the long-term.

In addition, all EU laws impacting the media sector should also be subject to a dedicated impact assessment, to ascertain their necessity and proportionality. Here, the EU can make a real and lasting difference by holding itself accountable to similar standards of law making which it expects Member States to comply with in the Media Freedom Act.

The European Commission must now follow through on all its promises to support free and independent media. EU rules affecting media service providers must work together to facilitate and not harm the sector, including when it comes to other forthcoming initiatives, such as the Digital Omnibus and the Digital Fairness Act.

Contact: Wout van Wijk