Mr President, Commissioner, it seems as if I am forever subject to Murphy’s law where this report is concerned, because I myself was in Romania when we voted on it in the Committee. I want to thank Mr van Velzen for his work in introducing the debate during my absence. I think it is important that we remember how matters stood when the directive was adopted. It was believed on that occasion that it was conditional access which would present the worst bottleneck when it came to our obtaining open TV. That is perhaps not the case now, but it is other parts of television’s distribution network which will become bottlenecks or gatekeepers if we do not watch out. Not only must it be possible to use different types of technical apparatus in combination with one another, but different computer programs must also be required to understand each other. At the same time, consumers have a great need for easily accessible information and can reasonably demand that the market should also be predictable. I think that, where TV is concerned, we shall, in the future, have a situation where digital TV will be a part of ever more integrated electronic functions in the home. It is therefore important that we should have an API, an Applications Programme Interface, which can be used as part of this integrated environment. This is also crucial when it comes to the electronic program guides. It is these two factors which the forthcoming provisions should especially concentrate on. I would also draw my fellow MEPs’ attention to the fact that these electronic program guides will be important in, for example, enabling parents to protect young children from material they do not wish them to see. Neither the decoders’ operating systems nor the electronic program values are at present mutually compatible. The parliamentary committee shares the view, as did the Commission, that the markets and techniques within the field of digital television have been developed beyond the scope of the directive. The regulations in the special directive we are now discussing ought therefore to be revised and can usefully be incorporated into those clusters of proposed modifications to directives governing the communications sector which we can expect from the Commission in a few weeks’ time. The rapporteur’s conclusion is that open standards are now needed. We are now seeing the second and third generation of equipment for digital television. The work being done on creating that kind of open standard for home multi-media equipment is well advanced, and the European Telecommunications Standardisation Institute, ETSI, will hopefully adopt the MHP standard. There are good reasons for accepting that this standard will form a basis for the future. Nonetheless, we cannot exclude the possibility that political decisions concerning standards will be needed in the future if the market cannot reach an agreement. Digital TV is distributed in a number of different ways which are technically not quite the same. Like traditional TV, digital TV can be broadcast across terrestrial networks, by cable and via satellite. These distribution systems at present have different degrees of penetration, but satellite distribution is the dominant system. Tomorrow, distribution by cable may, however, gain ground. With distribution by cable, there is an inbuilt return channel which provides direct access to interactive services on the network. I believe that access to interactive services is the sine qua non of digital TV’s becoming one of the important gateways to the information society. The different distribution systems mean that digital TV can also become a particularly important way for sparsely populated areas to access the Internet. An end to analogue TV broadcasts and a total changeover to digital TV are important if we are to be able to exploit the limited resource of the radio spectrum in an effective way. No one has yet been able to define under which conditions analogue broadcasts can cease. Digitalisation means that there will be challenges, especially perhaps for public service broadcasters which cannot subsidise the extra equipment required in the same way that conventional broadcasters can. How are licence fees to be collected in countries which finance broadcasting in this way and have a free-to-air tradition? I would also point out that the rapporteur vigorously supports the ‘must carry’ principle, or obligation on the part of cable operators to broadcast certain channels, and believes that this must continue. On the other hand, we ought not to make such demands as would impede the development of the very interactive services in question. Nor ought we to jeopardise the will to invest in upgrading the network. Even public service companies which previously broadcast their programmes free of charge are now in the process of setting up boundaries and making it more difficult to broadcast across national borders. In the background are issues of copyright. The TV companies’ copyright organisations ought to make the most of new opportunities to give those who want to watch digital programmes the right also to do so beyond the borders of the broadcasting country. That is a goal which we are already committed to achieve by the Treaty and by the ‘Television Without Frontiers’ Directive.

Political group: ELDR