Debate: Strengthening democracy, media freedom and pluralism in the EU
Date: WEDNESDAY, 10 NOVEMBER 2021
Speaker: Roberta Metsola
Country: Poland
Language: EN

Important for our institution, that MEPs came together to adopt a report that protects journalists. Important for our European democracy that this report is not only adopted but also implemented. Important for our societies’ gatekeepers that they know that we have their backs when they have nowhere else to turn to.  Strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs) are lawsuits that seek to muzzle our journalists and provide a chilling effect on public participation. They do this by financially and emotionally draining their targets, starting out with threats and continuing with legal action. Trends have shown an increase of these kinds of lawsuits over the past years. We need to be clear: this is not about people not being able to protect their reputation, this is about the abuse of our legal systems, and there is a fine balance that we have managed to achieve in this report. The SLAPP strategy is simple but effective, with criminals literally shopping around our jurisdictions, scouting out favourable laws to serve their purposes. In effect, this means that individual journalists are faced with a number of lawsuits filed against them in foreign jurisdictions. At that point, journalists are faced with a choice: stop reporting the facts or face costly and lengthy lawsuits in another foreign country. So journalists lose the case before it even starts. In some Member States, lawsuits are filed against them in their personal capacity in legal systems they are unaware of and have no connection with, meaning that, if they leave their job with a media house, the case could still follow them around. Mounting a defence is practically impossible, so those with the means get what they want and the story is effectively killed. Our message is: this is unacceptable. These lawsuits do not seek to obtain a favourable outcome, but they seek to intimidate. We have a system today that favours those who seek to hide the truth over those who seek to expose it. So there is no equality of arms in the system. There is no justice in the system, and we in this Parliament want to change that. This European Parliament has long been at the forefront of calling for a new anti-SLAPP legislation, and we want this report to be the foundation of a new EU anti-SLAPP directive. We have made sure that we have as many safeguards as necessary to protect our press, our journalists and civil society from SLAPPs while remaining within what is possible under the EU treaties. We are calling for a reform of the Brussels 1A Regulation to prevent forum shopping, and calling for the introduction of a uniform choice of law rule for defamation and the Rome 2 Regulation to give legal certainty. What we want do is combine legislation with complementary measures and create a system where judges are able to take a quick a priori decision that would see obviously vexatious lawsuits dismissed quickly and this means investing in training and creating systems that would allow for this. Our report calls for a fund, as said by my colleague, for SLAPP victims, for legal fees, legal aid, psychological support, training and an online information and support hub for potential victims of SLAPPs. We can make a difference. We look forward to listening to you, colleagues, the shadow rapporteurs we have worked excellently with, and also to you, Commissioner, we look forward to hearing from you.