Inter-Parliamentary Union	Association of Secretaries General of Parliaments	European Broadcasting Union

	The relationship between parliament and the citizen is an issue of growing importance everywhere. Many parliaments are working to open the institution to greater involvement of individuals and organizations that have a contribution to make to their work. They also want people to be better informed of what is done in parliament. As part of these efforts, parliaments are keen to have some of their proceedings broadcasted to a wider public. While some parliaments have established their own radio stations or TV channels that transmit directly to the public, more frequently parliaments rely on public broadcasting through public service stations or simply public broadcasters. In recent years, a number of new media outlets have emerged, using the internet or the digital environment to offer the public insights into parliamentary proceedings. This is an area of interest to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). The relationship between parliament and public broadcasters is a complex one. The media outlets are independent institutions that exercise editorial control over the content of their broadcasts. Parliaments are institutions that have a legitimate interest in broadcasters informing the public about their work, an interest which needs to be respected. The October Conference could be the start of a larger process. It has explored the relationship between parliaments and parliamentary channels and/or public broadcasters and try to identify good examples that may serve as inspiration for others, as well as examples of sharing experiences and materials. The process could also explore the possibility for the IPU to make recommendations to parliaments to establish a parliamentary channel in cases where it does not exist and to develop a network of existing parliamentary channels in order to facilitate exchange of material and expertise. The process could be developed by the IPU, ASGP (Association of Secretaries General of Parliaments) and EBU (European Broadcasting Union).

 

SESSION DOCUMENTS
	Conclusions by the Rapporteur, Mr. Erik Fichtelius [PDF]
	Final list of participants [PDF]
	Quotes and photos [PDF]
	Convocation [PDF]
	Practical information [PDF]
	Programme [HTML] [PDF]
RELATED SITES AND DOCUMENTS
	Association of Secretaries General of Parliaments Web site
	European Broadcasting Union Web site
Note: Documents in PDF format require Adobe Acrobat Reader

PROGRAMME
9 a.m.	Visit to EBU Headquarters in Geneva (departure from CICG by bus at 8.50 a.m.) Presentation of EBU: Mr. Jean Réveillon (Secretary General) Presentation of News Room: Mr. Piotr Azia (Editor)
10.15 a.m.	Opening remarks (CICG - 5 minutes each): - M. Anders B. Johnsson, IPU Secretary General - Mr. Anders Forsberg, ASGP President and Secretary General of the Swedish Parliament - Mr. Fritz Pleitgen, President of the EBU, Director general of WRD and former founder of Phoenix (German documentary and parliamentary channel).
10.30 a.m.	Panel discussion - Presentations (8 minutes each)
	Parliamentary activities: MPs, majority, opposition, minorities, media and citizens - Shared needs, different interests While Parliamentarians - from all political tendencies -, journalists and citizens are all interested in greater visibility for the role of legislators and the impact politics can have in daily life, they nonetheless have different interests. How can parliamentary channels and public broadcasting face this challenge?
	Panellists: - Mr. Dan Landau, former Head of the Knesset Network (TBC, Israel) (confirmed) - Mr. Carlos Hoffmann, Secretary General of the Chilean Parliament, ASGP Vice-President (confirmed) - Mr. Boris Bergant, EBU Vice-President (confirmed) - Mr. Joe Phaweni, Head of Policy Management Unit, South African Parliament (confirmed)
	Moderator: Mr. Luis Rivas, Director of News and Programmes - Euronews (confirmed)
11.15 a.m.	Open discussion
1 p.m.	Lunch break
2.15 p.m.	Parliamentary exchanges - EBU Services for Parliamentary channels by Mr. Peter Vickers, EBU Head of Marketing and Business Management - Eurovision Operations
2.30 a.m.	Panel discussion - Presentations (8 minutes each)
	Free and fair access to information on parliamentary activities and access to TV Channels Freedom of expression, access to information and access to parliamentary channels and public broadcasters are important. Moreover, representatives of different political tendencies, both majority and opposition, as well as minorities and gender balance must be respected
	Panelists: - Mr. Peter Knowles, Controller of BBC Parliament (United Kingdom) (confirmed) - Mr. Jean-Pierre Elkabbach, Head of Public Sénat channel (France) (confirmed) - Mr. Terry Murphy, C-SPAN Vice-President (confirmed) - Mr. Dawood Kuttab, Director of the Institute of Modern Media, Al Qods University, Ramallah (confirmed)
	Moderator: Mrs. Esther Mamarbachi, Télévision suisse romande - TSR (confirmed)
3.20 p.m.	Open discussion
4.30 p.m.	Report: Good practices and recommendations
	Rapporteur: Mr. Eric Fichtelius, Executive Producer and Editor of SVT 24 Direct (Sweden) (confirmed)
5 p.m.	Press Conference
5.30 p.m.	Tea, coffee, refreshments
Post Conference Publication IPU-ASGP-EBU Brochure