The Polish Government is Tinkering With the Pilots of the Poles. TVP Compulsory, TVN Disappears from the List

December 2, 2022 | RadioZet.com

The government has adopted changes to the Broadcasting Act, informed the Wirtualnemedia.pl portal. A revolution awaits the media market. Pay TV operators will be obliged to offer TVP channels, and commercial stations will drop from the list, e.g., TVN and Polsat.

The government passed the law in mid-November. The Wirtualnemedia.pl portal reached the document, the content of which – apart from fragments – was not available on the Internet.

One of the most important changes in the amendment to the Broadcasting Act concerns the must carry, must offer principle. It is about the list of stations that pay-TV operators must offer. Currently, the act lists seven terrestrial television stations available when the signal was broadcast in analog. Art. 43 of the Act listed the following channels: TVP 1, TVP2, TVP3 (regional branches), Polsat, TVN, TV4, and TV Puls.

The government adopted regulations strengthening the position of TVP.
According to the Wirtualnemedia.pl portal, the draft amendment changes the statutory list of channels covered by this principle. The list will be truncated. It will cease to include key commercial nationwide TV stations, i.e., TVN, Polsat, TV4, and TV Puls. Telewizja Polska’s channels will remain on TVP1, TVP2, and TVP3, which TVP Info and TVP Kultura will supplement.

The National Broadcasting Council will be able to add up to 30 additional channels to the list by regulation. “However, the National Broadcasting Council would be obliged to include on this list at least those public television programs that are digitally distributed by terrestrial broadcasting in a multiplex. The National Broadcasting Council could also include other programs on the list, taking into account the public interest.

Pursuant to the amendment, TVP channels covered by the must carry and must offer rules will have to be included in the first five positions of the electronic program guide (EPG) in the following order: TVP1. TVP2, TVP3, TVP Info and TVP Kultura. The former president of Telewizja Polska, Jacek Kurski, was striving for the appropriate version of TVP3 to be in third place in the operators’ set-top boxes.