France 3 and France Bleu will become a “single brand”, announces Sibyle Veil

2023-10-11 13:06:34

New stage of the marriage between television and local radio. The rapprochement between the television channel France 3 and the regional radio stations France Bleu will continue to ultimately result in “a unique brand” of local public broadcasting, the president of Radio France, Sibyle Veil, said this Wednesday.

“What we want with my colleague Delphine Ernotte from France Télévisions (…) is to create a public service media for local life,” declared Sybile Veil during a hearing before the Cultural Affairs Commission of the National Assembly.

According to her, this project is based on a “roadmap collected over time to lead to visible changes from the start of the next school year in 2024”. The president of Radio France recalled that France 3 and France Bleu had already set up “joint filmed morning shows” and launched a unique application called “ici”.

“We want to go further in the coming years, by pushing this editorial alliance on the model of what we did with (the news channel) franceinfo, namely a unique and modern brand on three vectors, TV, radio and digital” , continued Sibyle Veil, reappointed to her position at the end of 2022.

“Striking power”, defends Sibyle Veil

Already mentioned several times in recent months, internally or in the press, the continued merger between France Bleu and France 3 has aroused the fears of public broadcasting unions, who see it as the beginnings of a merger.

The fact of having “teams that all work under the same flag” guarantees “immense striking power and visibility”, pleaded the boss of Radio France, ensuring that there was in the public “an appetite for a local (…) modern media”.

In addition to the fixed budget for public broadcasting, the 2024 draft budget presented at the end of September by the government provides for an “additional envelope” of 200 million euros over three years (including 69 for 2024). It is “intended to finance transformation projects” which will be specified in the objectives and means contracts (COM) for 2024-28, which public audiovisual companies and the State are currently negotiating.

“This transformation budget will allow us to finance joint projects, the mergers that need to be considered to have a real editorial alliance between our two companies,” commented Sibyle Veil. She said she was “confident” in achieving the “transformation objectives” to which these credits are conditional.