חוק הרשות השנייה לטלוויזיה ורדיו (תיקון מס' 44), התשע"ח-2018Second Authority for Television and Radio Law (Amendment No. 44), 2018 · automatic translation · suggest a correction

Official summary of the law (Knesset)

The Law was passed in second and third reading on 19 February 2018 (hereinafter – the Amendment), and it amends the Second Authority for Television and Radio Law, 1990 (hereinafter – the Second Authority Law). The Amendment allows designated channels, which received their licenses under the Communications (Telecommunications and Broadcasting) Law, 1982, to become license holders under the Second Authority Law and accordingly move under the supervision of the Second Authority Council, while establishing a series of relaxations that will apply during this transition. Currently, there are four such channels, each dedicated to a particular subject (Israel's Heritage; Israeli and Mediterranean Music) or to a particular language (Russian; Arabic). In addition, the Law establishes a series of relaxations for television broadcast license holders under the Second Authority Law whose annual revenues are below 80 million NIS ("minor license holders"), as well as several regulatory relaxations for all license holders. These are the main points of the Amendment: • Regarding minor television broadcast license holders – establishing exemptions from various obligations, both for existing license holders and for new license holders, including exemption from content obligations such as expenditure for the production of premium-genre programming, expenditure for financing Israeli films, and local production obligations; exemption from the obligation to broadcast news, unless the license holder chooses to broadcast news, in which case it may do so under relaxed conditions. At the same time, an obligation to invest in Israeli productions or their broadcast was established for most minor license holders. • Regarding the designated channels moving under the supervision of the Second Authority Council – additional relaxations were established, most for limited periods: preservation of the broadcast channels (channel numbers) on which they were broadcast on the eve of the Amendment's commencement, exemption from license fees and transfer fees, exemption from restrictions on various types of cross-ownership as well as exemption from the single shareholder holding limit, and provisions regarding the spreading out of obligations; • Regarding all license holders: focusing the powers of the Second Authority and the Second Authority Council; increasing the single shareholder holding limit in a television broadcast license holder to 74% (instead of 51%) and also increasing the possible holding of a foreign shareholder in a television broadcast license holder to 74% (instead of 49%); adding the possibility of broadcasting advertising content under certain conditions and according to rules to be established; exemption from the minimum news broadcast investment obligation for a license holder whose annual revenues are below 350 million NIS; for license holders not exempt from the premium-genre investment obligation (i.e., non-minor license holders) – establishing that the investment in premium-genre programs will be, instead of a predetermined fixed amount, at a rate of 15% of the license holder's revenues, as well as reducing regulatory intervention in the types of productions to be produced within this framework.

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