Last June it was the turn of the States General of the economy, while now the topical news could be the convocation of the States General of the audiovisual system or of the entire TLC sector. This is the topic being debated in recent days, in particular between the Government, the political forces that support it and the seventh floor of Viale Mazzini, which, as far as we have been able to verify, has been directly involved in the organization planned for next November 18th. This is still confidential news and full of unknowns, both on a strictly political level and on that of the convergence of interests to adhere to such an initiative by those directly involved, in particular the OTTs.
Let's see the subjects in the field. There are at least two good institutional reasons that could lead to support this project. The first refers to a precise commitment by the current Government where, in point 14 of its programme, it has planned to put its hand to reforming the entire telecommunications sector of the country. If until a few weeks ago this could have been more or less relegated to the category of good intentions, since the blows from Brussels arrived - with the indications of the Court of Justice on the need to revise the previous system law (the Gasparri of 2004) and to incorporate the community provisions included in the Delegation Law which will have to pass the scrutiny of the Chambers – now it no longer seems possible to postpone the times. Playing even more in this direction is the fact that, until the end of September, AgCom was not yet fully established and fully functional. Now, however, the new council led by the president Giacomo Lasorella is in the saddle and will be able (should) exercise the duties within his competence.
The second argument that could support the need to convene these States General consists in giving new breath to the debate on the creation of a single UBB network. Debate that in recent weeks has diluted compared to when, between the end of August and mid-September, everything seemed to go smoothly, to the great satisfaction of the Government which has spent much of its credibility on this topic.
The political forces on the subject of TLC and the national audiovisual system suffer from a problem of credibility and recognition of proposals and contents that is not easy to solve. Reducing to a minimum, they are not internally homogeneous entities. The M5S and the Democratic Party do not have uniformity of views and even internally they are sufficiently divided. If you try, as we have done several times, to ask what project, idea or proposal they have for the national public broadcasting service, it is quite probable that you will come up against a rubber wall of uncertainty and confusion.
Example? The Rai canon. Should it be abolished or reduced? Will the contents of the Public Service have to be all "free" on the net, as Aldo Fontanarosa wrote in the last few days on Repubblica.it? Try asking these questions to the minister directly concerned, Stefano Patuanelli (M5S), who, no later than last November, declared to the Supervisory Authority: "I believe that the transfer of the fee to the electricity bill, with the reduction of evasion and therefore with the increase in revenue, should lead to a reduction in the fee starting from the weakest groups. This must be done after a reorganization and cost rationalization. And in this I express the position of the government”. The declaration of the Minister for Autonomies arrived shortly after, Francesco Boccia (PD): “I don't think a license fee, at the time of the digital society, entirely absorbed by Rai is more tolerable. We need to open a serious debate, among other things, on the destination of the portion of the Rai license fee, paid by the citizens".
Now, as far as is known to know, the Minister of Economy Roberto Gualtieri he was summoned for the next few days by the Parliamentary Supervisory Commission precisely to report on the Government's intentions on the resources to be assigned to Rai, in view of a budget hole that already for next year shows a red figure with two zeros. It is difficult to know if the majority shareholder Rai will have the time, the way and the opportunity to reveal some cards. So as not to go too far, it cannot fail to take into account the trend of the advertising market which may no longer be able to support and feed too many interested parties, thus accepting the requests of those who would like Rai to be reduced in its claims (see Mediaset). The moment does not seem the best and the Rai dossier may not be at the center of Gualtieri's problems. But, even more, the minister's possible resistance could be accompanied by that of the part of his party which has not revealed all the cards on these topics, in particular the single network. And here we go back to the opening news. Who is it convenient for at this moment to open a kermesse with the sole result of bringing out more differences than convergences? Furthermore, it is true that the Italian TLC system needs one guidance rational and effective, just as it is also true that its possible reform cannot ignore that of its perhaps most important component, if not from the point of view of economic value at least from a social and cultural point of view, i.e. Rai. Topic on which, as it is easy to verify, we are very far from any convergence of project or vision.
