THE NEED TO CLOSE THE GAP BETWEEN CITIZENS AND PARLIAMENT
Some 180 specialists from parliaments, parliamentary channels and public broadcasters, coming from 80 countries and meeting in Geneva underscored the need to create a direct link between citizens and the media, and to close the gap between citizens and parliament - the body that represents citizens in their entirety: an interesting challenge indeed.
It is a fact that citizens must be kept informed and parliaments must reach out to the people and better communicate with them, but are parliaments ready to do that without any interference? In any democracy, public institutions must be transparent and accountable to the people and public broadcasting of parliamentary proceedings can foster that transparency and accountability. The first ever conference on parliamentary broadcasting convened in October by the IPU, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and the Association of Secretaries General of Parliaments (ASGP) provided some useful insights in that regard.
The debates, moderated by Mr. Luis Rivas, Euronews Director of News and Programmes, and Ms. Esther Mamarbachi, anchorwoman at the Swiss French-language television station, TSR, pointed to the need to follow up this process which could give greater visibility to parliaments and to their world organization, the IPU.
Mr. Peter Vickers, EBU Head of Marketing and Business Management, Eurovision Operations Department, suggested that a forum be established where parliamentary channels could exchange content freely. This should be done on a reciprocal, free copyright basis. Eurovision would be the platform that delivers this content, either live or in edited form, so that citizens all over the world could follow important decisions taken in different parliaments of the world.
IPU Secretary General, Mr. Anders B. Johnsson, his EBU counterpart, Mr. Jean Réveillon, and ASGP President, Mr. Anders Forbserg, met recently in Geneva to discuss follow-up of the Geneva Conference. As soon as they receive the responses to questionnaires sent out by the three institutions to their respective members, concrete proposals will be made to follow up on this unique initiative, which will herald a new era for parliaments, televisions and broadcasters.
L.B.
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