WRITTEN QUESTION E-2216/99

by Enrico Ferri (PPE-DE) to the Commission

(29 November 1999)

Subject: Application of the principle of the free movement of services (Article 49 of the EC Treaty) with regard to the rules on the personal use of satellite dishes

The use of satellite dishes to receive television and radio programmes and information society services is constantly on the increase.

They are an important cross-border vehicle for European economic and cultural integration, particularly for those living abroad who wish to obtain information from their countries of origin in order to ensure that their ties to their homeland remain strong.

Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms enshrines the right to impart and receive information.

Furthermore, the Commission has recently begun infringement proceedings against a Member State in order to have it abolish a number of fiscal and administrative charges relating to the personal use of satellite dishes.

Several Member States are also drawing up legislation on the use of such dishes.

Some general benchmarks should, however, be established; these must be sufficiently clear to reconcile the principle of the free movement of services within the single market with the need to safeguard town-planning objectives in order to minimise and control the impact of satellite dishes in aesthetic and architectural terms, especially near towns or areas containing monuments of historic and artistic interest.

In the light of the above, would the Commission not consider it useful and indeed advisable to draw up some guidelines (e.g. via explanatory documents based on previous texts of a similar kind) to clarify the scope and effects of the fundamental principle of the free movement of services within the single market (Article 49 of the EC Treaty) in relation to the regulation of the use of satellite dishes? This would not only steer national legislators and local administrators in the right direction and facilitate their decisions whilst ensuring compliance with Community law, but would also give individual users of satellite dishes, and consequently all those operating in the field, greater legal certainty.

Answer given by Mr Bolkestein on behalf of the Commission

(20 January 2000)

The Commission considers the question raised by the Honourable Member to be an important one in the light of growing use of satellite dishes for the reception of eminently cross-border services such as broadcasting services and information society services transmitted by satellite.

It is precisely with this in mind that the Commission has, over the last few years, initiated infringement proceedings against certain Member States for tax and administrative barriers to the individual use of satellite dishes.

These infringement proceedings, some of which are still under way, have targeted the obligation laid down in some countries' regulatory provisions generally adopted at local level to make the installation of each dish subject to administrative authorisation or to payment of an annual tax, and a particularly high one at that.

As it has already declared publicly(1), the Commission considers that, because of their discriminatory and, in any event, disproportionate nature, these measures are incompatible with the fundamental principle of free movement of services within the internal market, as laid down by Article 49 (former Article 59) of the EC Treaty.

However, it does recognise the possibility, as pointed out by the Honourable Member, that, in certain circumstances, specific grounds of historical and artistic protection should also be taken into consideration by the national authorities, while of course meeting the criteria of non-discrimination, necessity and proportionality, in accordance with the Court of Justice's consistent case law on the free movement of services.

In the light of these considerations and the keen interest shown by the public in these infringement proceedings, the Commission will seriously consider the suggestion made by the Honourable Member that a document be prepared in the near future to clarify, for the benefit of the interested parties (users, operators and national authorities), the scope and effects of Article 49 with regard to the use of satellite dishes.

It should also be noted that the Commission recently adopted a communication on the strategy for Europe's internal market which did in fact stress the outlook for the digital era and the promotion of consumers' economic interests(2).

(1) IP/99/281 of 3 May 1999.

(2) COM(1999) 624 final.