Slovakia

[SK] Increased Licence Fees for Public Service Broadcasting

IRIS 2003-9:1/24

Eleonora Bobáková

Department of International Relations Council for Broadcasting and Retransmission Slovakia

Since 1 August 2003 the amount of radio and television licence fees, which is to be paid monthly by the owner of a TV and / or radio set and which are revenues of public service Slovak television and Slovak radio collected by Slovak Post from 1,165,542 TV-households, was increased automatically as the amendment of the zákon o koncesionárskych poplatkoch (Act on Licence Fees of 1995) has come into power.

The new legal provision, Act no 241/2003 on the amendment of the Act on licence fees and on the amendment of the Act no. 468/1991 on radio and television broadcasting , set the monthly fee for one TV set at SKK 100 (previously SKK 75, EUR 1 = SKK 42,239 based on the rate of the National bank of Slovakia on 22 September 2003) and for a radio set to SKK 40 (previously SKK 30) for both natural and legal persons. Natural persons have to pay just for one radio / TV receiver, regardless of the number of further receivers in their households. In contrast, legal persons and sole traders have to pay for each TV / radio set that features in their bookkeeping.

Retired persons who have received an exemption from fees so far, have lost this benefit and are required to register as fee payers and to pay half of the monthly fees, that is to say SKK 50 for TV set and SKK 20 for radio set. However, the following categories are still exempt from the requirement to pay for radio and TV licences: persons who are officially recognised as people with a severe handicap, foreigners living in Slovakia without the status of permanent stay, representatives and diplomatic missions, international governmental organisations, institutions providing social care and humanitarian services, daily care establishments for pre-school children, schools, hospitals and detention centres. Moreover the Act no. 241/2003 has charged broadcasters of public radio service and public television service both to use the revenues from licence fees "to cover only the costs of production and distribution of programmes in accordance with a programme scheme approved by relevant supervisory body - Slovak Radio Board, Slovak Television Board."

The rise in licence fees in 2003 is one of the important steps the State declared through the Director General of STV towards stabilizing financial control of public service television. The second step is to settle old debts of STV amounting to SKK 600 Millions. The last element in the relevant legal framework will be to adopt legislation, either as an individual instrument or as part of the Act on Slovak television, allowing Slovak television to control its own business affairs (sale of advertising time, establishing joint ventures, etc). Eventually in 2004 Slovak television shall be financed only by revenue generated from licence fees and commercial revenues without any further direct contribution from the State.