Italy

[IT] Bill setting up an Authority to oversee communications and radio and television standards

IRIS 1996-8:1/22

Roberto Zaccaria

Faculty of Law, University of Florence

The Italian Cabinet has approved a Bill setting up an Authority to oversee communications and radio and television standards. The Bill will become law after it has been approved by the Public Works Committee of the Senate. Article 1 establishes the Authority as a single organisation covering the radio and television and the telecommunications sectors. The Authority comes under a Chairman and is made up of three bodies, each with specific functions. The three bodies consist of two committees, one covering infrastructure and networks and the other dealing with products and services and a third structure, comprising the Council, a plenary organisation made up of the Chairman and the committee members. The Chairman is appointed by the Government, while the committee members are elected in equal numbers by each of the two Chambers, by restricted ballot. Article 2 sets out the principles and the rules as to the ban on dominant positions, in line with anti-trust legislation. It also provides the Authority with executive legislative powers.

Apart from limiting the use of terrestrial frequencies (set nationally at 20% of television or radio channels), the Bill also sets precise ceilings for the economic activities of the sector as a whole, in other words for the profit that can be had nationally in the television sector (30% of resources), in the radio sector, in communications by cable and satellite, in the whole of the publishing and local and national television sector and in advertising ( see also IRIS 1996-7: 13).