UTECA: Spain Government ‘favours pay-TV’
November 22, 2017
From David Del Valle in Madrid
UTECA, the largest private TV Association in Spain, has accused the Administration of discrimination against FTA TV to the benefit of pay-TV and new OTT platforms.
The president of UTECA, Alejandro Echevarría, has urged the Government to put an end to the “favourable treatment” of pay-TV operators and demanded “legal changes” to make the new “pay TV distributors” (OTT platforms) meet the same legal requirements and limits as the FTA operators.
He explained that whereas FTA operators must comply by strict limits and obligations “within a tight legal framework”, the new TV distributors, “mostly multinational companies are operating in a legal jungle with no limits and few obligations”.
Echevarría accused Netflix and HBO, among others, of not meeting the fiscal obligations in Spain by not paying taxes (by having their headquarters outside of the country) and for not complying with the obligation of financing (with a per centage on their revenues) public broadcaster RTVE; or of investing in the production of European TV content.
UTECA is also concerned about the second digital dividend to be completed in 2020 and has urged the Government not to restrict the spectrum even more for FTA operators to the benefit of pay-TV.