Members of the European Parliament have called for legislative and non-legislative tools to protect journalists and media organisations from Strategic Lawsuits Against Public Participation (SLAPPs), designed to intimidate and silence them.
In a resolution adopted on Wednesday, MEPs voiced concerns about attacks on EU media in some member states and calls for urgent action to help news media be fit for the “Digital Decade”.
The resolution, passed by 577 votes to 47 and 76 abstentions, pushes for substantial support for the media sector from the EU and member states in order to help the sector recover from the pandemic and transform itself to keep pace with the changing business models of the digital age.
The resolution calls for a news media fund and stresses that EU recovery funds earmarked for the media must support media organisations in those EU countries where media face particular financial and political pressure or rule-of-law concerns.
According to early estimates, during the pandemic news media saw its advertising revenues drop by between 20 and 80 per cent.
MEPs also pointed to the dangers of the “disproportionate economic impact” and “predatory behaviour” of global online platforms that dominate data and advertising markets and have the power to remove legal content provided by media services. They demanded the urgent adoption of the Digital Services and Digital Markets acts to provide a level playing field for the EU media and ensure equal access to data and rules on online political advertising.
MEPs will next month vote on a report for a European anti-SLAPP law drawn up by Maltese MEP and EP vice-president Roberta Metsola, and socialist MEP Tiemo Wölken. The report proposes measures to counteract the threat that SLAPPs pose to journalists, NGOs and civil society.
The report calls for European laws to prevent cross border SLAPP, the transposition of these rules in domestic laws in member states and proposes training for judges to be able to see when a lawsuit is abusive. It also proposes a fund that can be used by journalists facing such lawsuits as well as technical assistance to counter them at minimal expense.