ARD and ZDF: EUR 18.36 broadcasting fee is enough – for now

by time news

Et has once again become around 460 pages with many tables. The 23rd financial report of the “Commission for determining the financial needs of broadcasters”, abbreviated to KEF. Created by 16 experts, including former heads of audit offices, auditors and professors for media management and broadcasting law – an expert from each federal state.

The bottom line is that the current calculations show that the broadcasting fee can remain at EUR 18.36 per household per month until 2024. The head of the KEF, Martin Detzel, professor of business administration in Karlsruhe, stated on Friday afternoon in Berlin that the public broadcasters are sufficiently financed with an amount of 38.8 billion euros.

The KEF plays a key role in the procedure for determining the license fee. The institutions register their financial needs, the KEF checks this registration and cuts it if necessary – then the federal states have to approve the recommendation made by the KEF. If they don’t, you need very good reasons.

The past year has shown that a single federal state that does not want to go along with an increase is in a losing position. The KEF recommendations are accordingly quite binding. Which makes their responsibility for a precise examination of the budgets of ARD, ZDF and Deutschlandradio correspondingly large.

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Moral Discourse Shift

Specifically, the state of Saxony-Anhalt evaded a final vote on the increase in contributions last autumn, so the increase from EUR 17.50 to EUR 18.36 per month was delayed by a few months until the Federal Constitutional Court finally legitimized the increase.

No compensation

At the moment, however, the financial experts see no need to compensate the institutions for lost income (around 40 million households have paid 86 cents less than planned per month – we are talking about a good 300 million euros). Because: the financing is secured. After all, the broadcasters had been granted almost 2.5 billion euros more than in the previous contribution period.

Corona does not seem to have weakened the financial situation of the broadcasters – according to the current status – in a sustainable manner. The short and medium-term effects of Corona are “currently still difficult to assess”, the commission stated. The KEF chairman Detzel, who only recently took over from the long-standing chairman Heinz Fischer-Heidlberger, sees additional demand (increased production costs, hygiene measures, etc.) roughly in balance with savings effects (travel expenses, reduced VAT).

The KEF had already reduced the original demands of the institutions by around 1.6 billion euros, the financial requirement ultimately accepted for four years was 27.7 billion euros for ARD, 10.1 billion euros for ZDF and around 1 billion euros for Deutschlandradio.

Malu Dreyer, SPD Prime Minister of Rhineland-Palatinate, with KEF report

Malu Dreyer, SPD Prime Minister of Rhineland-Palatinate, with KEF report

Source: dpa

The KEF is particularly concerned about rising costs for the distribution of online content (telemedia) and live streams. The actual costs by 2024 are expected to be at least 225 million euros higher than the planned total costs. According to the KEF calculation, ZDF in particular is well above the costs of the previous period, by a whopping 70 percent. The Commission expects better controlling here. In the entire telemedia sector, personnel costs alone amount to 767 million euros. An indication of how much the importance of online media has increased.

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Above the roofs of Cologne: Draft of the WDR film house

The so-called major investments of the institutions, which are in particular real estate projects, are under special observation. Including the exorbitantly expensive renovation of the film house in Cologne. The KEF blocked 69.1 million euros from WDR two years ago because there were serious doubts about the economic viability of the project. Now the committee wants to have all building projects checked by an expert opinion.

KEF also keeps an eye on the high pension obligations of the public-law institutions, whose degree of coverage through provisions is forecast to continue to decrease in the coming years.

The KEF had already pointed out in a statement at the end of January that the planned flexibilisation of the broadcasting system would “rather lead to increased costs”. In a draft for a new media state treaty, the commissioning of special interest channels such as Tagesschau24 and ZDFneo by politicians is to be abolished. Means that the institutions are freer in the conception of these offers. However, as the KEF pointed out, this does not automatically mean that money will be saved.

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On the contrary – a shift to digital distribution channels is likely to lead to higher costs. Or a changed concept – this is how ARD is planning to turn the Tagesschau24 channel into a fully-fledged news service. Apparently at no extra cost. Of course, this has to be proven, because where expansion takes place, there are usually additional costs that would have to be saved elsewhere.

It is precisely such strategies by broadcasters that require stringent cost controls. The longstanding and now former KEF boss Fischer-Heidlberger emphasized again on Friday how important transparency and comparability are for the work of the commission. The institutions are urgently requested to make their systems and the costs behind them comparable. Because it is easy to guess in which direction the broadcasting fee will move after 2024.

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