Netherlands

[NL] New Sponsorship Rules for Public Broadcasters

IRIS 1995-7:1/15

Ad van Loon

European Audiovisual Observatory

New sponsorship rules for the Dutch public broadcasters came into force on 1 July 1995. The amendment of the Media Act follows the obligation to implement the EEC Directive "Television without frontiers". The original proposal of the Government to change the sponsorship regime was rather strict: sponsoring of programmes of the public broadcasters would not be allowed except for programmes in the categories of sports, culture, information and education. Parliament turned the proposal around by allowing sponsoring, with the exception of news programmes, children's programmes and consumer information. As a result, the Media Act now inter alia allows the display of brand names (previously strictly prohibited), as long as the their display is not "excessive".