A broad package of reforms committed to matters such as transparency in the Executive, the Legislative and the media or the protection of freedom of expression. The so-called Action Plan for Democracy approved today by the Council of Ministers complies with some long-standing demands of the majority of parliamentary partners and introduces changes to the gag law, the law on official secrets or the Penal Code with regard to the protection of freedom of expression or the crime of insulting state institutions, one of the main demands of Sumar during the negotiation of the text with the PSOE within the coalition.
The plan includes 31 measures that the Government plans to implement over the next 3 years to “provide greater transparency to the media within the framework of what the EU already establishes.” “We are going to work hand in hand with the parliamentary groups. We want to reinforce the cleanliness of our democracy,” says the Minister of Justice and Relations with Parliament, Félix Bolaños, who, together with the Minister of Culture, Ernest Urtasun, has coordinated the work.
In the text approved today by the Council of Ministers, and to which elDiario.es has had access, the Government undertakes, for example, to “address a comprehensive reform of the articles of the Penal Code that may affect the right to freedom of expression and artistic creation, among other cases when it refers to state institutions, deals with crimes against religious feelings or public ridicule or other assumptions, in order to give them a wording comparable to those of countries around us and to attend to the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights, in the matter of defamation and its legal framework. According to sources of the negotiation, it is about addressing, among others, the specific case of insults to the crown.
The plan also includes a broad chapter on measures related to the media, primarily regarding funding and transparency. Thus, it establishes “the introduction of limits on the funding that public administrations can allocate to the media, so that there are no media promoted by or dependent on public administrations.”
Reference is also made to the “review of the regulatory framework to guarantee pluralism by avoiding concentration of the media”, as well as to the approval of a National Strategy to combat disinformation campaigns. Also related to the media and in the series of proposals for the “Promotion of a higher quality of public debate”, the reform of Organic Law 1/1982, of May 5, on civil protection of the right to honor, personal and family privacy and one’s own image and of Organic Law 2/1984, of March 26, regulating the right of rectification, is proposed to improve the system to request and achieve the rectification of false or openly biased news.
The document, which was agreed by the two Government partners in the framework of a negotiation that lasted until late on Monday with the main issue of the reform of the Penal Code regarding crimes related to freedom of expression, commits to a reform of the Law on Institutional Advertising. Firstly, “to introduce criteria of transparency, proportionality and non-discrimination in its allocation”. And also “to guarantee that audience measurement systems and the methodology they use comply with the principles of transparency, impartiality, inclusiveness, proportionality, non-discrimination, comparability and verifiability”.
“Although it is a first step, it is a historic one,” says Culture Minister Ernest Urtasun, who also revealed the creation of a media registry and a review of the law on institutional advertising “so that the audience systems comply with the principles of transparency.”
Congressional Regulations, Gag Law and Official Secrets
The regulations of the Congress of Deputies will be subject to several changes related to transparency, which both elected officials and political parties must comply with. The proposal is to “strengthen sanctions for members who fail to submit a declaration of assets or who submit false or incomplete information.” The proposal also aims to review “the sanctioning regime applicable to political parties that submit their accounts in an inadequate manner.” The annual State of the Nation Debate will also be made mandatory.
The reform of the gag law is another of the long-standing demands of the group of progressive parliamentary partners of the Government and the plan also refers to it, although without any specific details. In the chapter on “Establishing greater guarantees of the independence of the media” the “reform of Organic Law 4/2015, of March 30, on the protection of citizen security, in its article 36, section 23, on the qualification of the sanction for the use of images of the State Security Forces and Corps” is established.
The battery of measures includes specific changes to the Organic Law on the General Electoral Regime to establish the obligation “to hold electoral debates between male and female candidates”, as well as to establish an obligation to publish all microdata from electoral surveys.
Another historical desire of the parliamentary left and some nationalist forces such as the PNV is not detailed, but it is committed to: the pre-constitutional law on official secrets dating from 1968. In the agreement that is being promoted today, it is argued that “the contemporary context advises a reform of this norm. An advanced and guaranteeing framework is needed to replace a pre-constitutional law, in force since 1968, to update it and adapt it to the best standards of the legislation of the democratic countries in our environment. The reform of the Law on Official Secrets implies a greater standardization of our legislation, combining national security with the right to information and transparency. Likewise, this reform also implies complying with one of the recommendations included in the Report on the Rule of Law in recent years.”
Source: www.eldiario.es
