Emmanuel Macron had made it a campaign promise.
It was a campaign promise from candidate Macron. According to the report of the Council of Ministers on Wednesday, the government wishes to abolish the audiovisual license fee from 2022. “The contribution to public broadcasting will be permanently abolished this year and the financing of public broadcasting will be ensured in compliance with the constitutional objective of pluralism and independence of the media.“, Indicates the government, in the transcription of a communication from the Minister of the Economy Bruno Le Maire during the Council of Ministers. In Bercy, it is confirmed that “the objective” is indeed to ratify this deletion “in 2022”, via the amending finance bill (PLFR) which will be presented after the legislative elections in June.
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More than 3 billion euros in revenue
During the presidential campaign, this measure had been decided in order to support the purchasing power of households. Every year, those who own a television must pay a license fee of 138 euros. This tax brings in more than 3 billion euros net every year. It funds public sector TV and radio channels, such as France Télévisions, Radio France, Arte and France Médias Monde.
Emmanuel Macron was not the only one to have made this promise. Candidates Valérie Pécresse (LR), Marine Le Pen (RN) and Éric Zemmour (Reconquests) had also announced their intention to abolish the fee.
During the presidential campaign, the announcement of the possible disappearance of the fee had given rise to fears about a risk of loss of independence of the public audiovisual media vis-à-vis the State. At the time, the government wanted to reassure. “We need strong public broadcasting in a context of misinformation, in a context where the digital giants circulate information that is not always sourced, we need public broadcasting because it also participates in the french creation“, had indicated his spokesman Gabriel Attal on France Inter, before adding: “we will continue to finance it, to guarantee its means, its independence“.
It is not certain that the fears have been extinguished, however, insofar as the mechanism which should replace the TV license fee in order to finance public broadcasting has not yet been specified. This question was at the heart of a mission by the General Inspectorate of Finance (IGF) and the General Inspectorate of Cultural Affairs (IGAC), mandated last October by the executive.
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