Parliaments and media

For debate in the Standing Committee - See Rule 47

Pour débat à la Commission Permanente - Voir article 47 du Règlement

As an expression of the sovereignty of the people, parliaments are at the centre of the political debate. However, to a large extent citizens know little about their work, despite the public character of their deliberations, their efforts to disseminate information through various publications, the recording of debates and the possibility for journalists to have access to elected officials. The media have a vital role to play in heightening the awareness of their audience to parliamentary activities. In most cases, the space given to parliamentary work is not likely to attract attention.

Pluralist democracy can only suffer from this state of affairs. The report submitted to the Assembly analyses the reasons for this, some of which have to do with the dry and often specialised nature of parliamentary work, its inevitable lengthiness resulting from procedures which guarantee a democratic functioning, and the attraction of the prominent role of the executive in initiating policy and decision-making. Other reasons include the way in which the media make their choices, which are based on criteria of topicality and constraints linked to the priority objective of attaining the broadest audience possible.

The solutions proposed in the report are designed to make parliamentary work more responsive to the need for better access to documents, be it for consultation purposes or for ensuring that they are intelligible for non-specialist readers, and for more open committee work, an improvement of the working conditions of journalists in parliaments and the use of modern means of telecommunications.

1. The Assembly is aware of the difficulties that face the parliamentary institution in preserving its position as the cornerstone of democracy. The citizens in most European countries do not feel involved enough, or at all, in the on-going debate in Parliament and are not aware of its agenda and activity.

2. Communication is vital for bridging the gap between elected representatives and the citizens. Parliaments should therefore promote better co-operation with the media, in order to enhance public dialogue with the citizens.

3. However, for reasons of profitability, most mass media follow certain criteria, driven, for example, by the need to entertain or to focus on spectacular events, which makes it difficult for parliamentary activities to gain coverage.

4. Moreover, the lesser ability of parliaments in numerous European countries to take the initiative and make policy decisions as compared with governments causes the media to neglect parliaments in favour of governments, resulting in a loss of credibility for those parliaments.

5. By the very nature of their work, parliaments cannot react to events with the same promptness as governments. Nor are the lengthy parliamentary procedures, which are essential for the careful scrutiny of bills, in keeping with the faster dissemination of news through modern communications technologies.

6. The role of parliaments as central political fora for debates has been weakened in recent years. The reason for this lies in competition from the media which promote fast and unconventional debates and comments.

7. The media landscape is highly complex. Alongside the sensationalist media which jeopardise the development of a constructive public dialogue, quality newspapers and magazines and a serious public radio and television service continue to objectively cover a wide range of news, including parliamentary news. They ensure that high standards are maintained by meeting, as best they can, the basic aims of the media: informing, commenting, providing a means of communication between different social groups, giving public opinion the means with which to develop critical judgement.

8. However, their emphasis on quality can be undermined by market forces, and media diversity, so necessary to the proper functioning of democracy, finds itself challenged. Parliaments should therefore consider measures aimed at preserving the role of quality media.

9. Without adaptation to the modern communication methods, parliaments could easily see their activity overtaken by other mediators using new means of expression of people's will. Therefore, parliaments need to keep up with the realities of a global communication society.

10. Extensive use of the new information technologies, should therefore be considered as an important "ingredient" of the policy pursued by parliamentary communication services in the interests of public debate.

11. The Assembly invites national parliaments to urgently consider measures aimed at:

1. The subject of "parliaments and media" covers two big issues: the relations between parliament and media, and the role of parliaments as legislators on media in the member states.

2. The present report will endeavour to ascertain the reasons accounting for the limited media space granted to parliaments and possible solutions for improving the situation.

3. The relationship between parliaments and media has become particularly complex in recent years. Parliaments, faced with growing competition from the executive power and with marked indifference of the media towards their activities, must urgently find new ways of bringing the political debate closer to people. Moreover, the astounding development of new information technologies and the resulting economic challenges, are already bringing about radical changes in communication methods and practices which serve to carry the political message through.

4. At the same time, the power of the media is growing and paradoxically this can have repercussions on journalists' real freedom of expression as well as on their duty to provide full information, inter alia about parliamentary proceedings. Not only must journalists guard against being conditioned by the political power, they must also beware of conditioning by other powers. In the face of such risks, parliaments and media could be partners in carrying out the task to promote democracy.

5. Politicians and media are forced to find a balance on the thin edge between two opposite forces, of attraction and rejection. However, the basic principle of their coexistence has remained unchanged: both parliaments and media serve to get the public involved in the political debate, to raise issues of major importance for the citizens.

6. Parliament, as the cornerstone of pluralist democracy, is the architect of freedom of expression. As an institution, it guarantees the exercise of this freedom by the media. For pluralist democracy to work properly, it must also secure the citizens' commitment to and participation in political life. This means that they must be well-acquainted with parliamentary activities which is only possible if they feel that topics discussed at Parliament are close to their everyday concerns.

7. As political issues in modern society become increasingly complex, the decision-making process is being gradually shifted from public structures towards closed technocratic circles within governments. This process painfully affects the whole social body, through parliaments to ordinary citizens, who feel a widening gap between the everyday problems they have to face and the "abstract", in their eyes, functioning of the state structures.

8. More and more citizens feel alienated from political dialogue and from the political decisions which are being made at the top. Their participation in political life is often only limited to elections and even there, the turn-out percentages point downwards. Public prestige of institutions is being eroded.

9. As a result, the political dialogue encounters increasing difficulties to get through by traditional methods. People revert to other forms of communication offered by the media; politicians do the same, both searching for a less abstract (or institutionalised), more individual contact.

10. The media, also, are going through a difficult period. As the financial pressure of a global market and the challenges of the new information technologies are growing, the media are compelled to adopt market-orientated methods of presentation. In these conditions, the so-called "quality press", as well as the "quality" radio- and television programmes which try to keep their information on an objective and unbiased level, find it difficult to keep up with.

11. Some media set up their own political agenda, in which newsworthiness often rhymes with "show-worthiness". Schematisation and entertainment are emphasised because of the need to captivate the public at all costs and to keep in step with the accelerating rhythm of life. This overrides the effort demanded by an interesting approach to the manifold nature of the issues at stake.

12. Conflicts are dealt with purely as current news events, although they cannot be understood without some knowledge of the past. The flow of information sent out without any contextual background exceeds the understanding of media audiences.

13. The gap between parliamentary debate and media content can grow even further up to the stage where the questions that the media put to political leaders could often be far from what people really wish to ask.

14. Therefore, there is a real danger of distorting the original role, both of parliaments as representatives of the people's will and of media as the expression of public awareness.

15. The only remedy to this situation is that parliamentarians strive to look upon media as a powerful means of dialogue with their electorate and, at the same time, recognise their role of counter-power.

16. Parliaments should modernise, in terms of working objectives and methods as a whole and in terms of communication policy in particular. Politicians have to go through a difficult learning process in order to be able to communicate in the era of the global electronic village. A failure could put democracy at risk.

17. Greater openness is the crucial point in securing the interest, the greater involvement and confidence of public opinion in parliamentary affairs. This process will unavoidably go together with an improved access to parliamentary texts as well as with some necessary adjustments in the decision-making and debating procedures.

18. At the same time, a boost should be given to parliamentary hearings in order to make sure that their decisions as a means of taking into account the suggestions made by the citizens. Talking to the electorate in the constituencies is not enough: the different committees in Parliament should make sure that they bring together as many representatives of different trends in the civil society as possible and that the participation of NGOs in decision-preparing shall be really ensured.

19. Journalists face new challenges, too. On the one hand, they will be confronted with the competition of Internet. On the other, much will depend on them to defend certain moral and ethical values in the new global communication environment.

20. Some problems arising between parliaments and media are conditioned by the very nature of both institutions:

21. Parliament is a deliberating and decision-taking, not a news-making institution. Inevitably, the proceedings take time, in order to examine all the aspects of a problem and to reach a majority between parliamentary members.

22. The media cannot report lengthy debates in full; newspapers, for instance, cannot afford to transform their pages to minutes of parliamentary proceedings. Every summary, even that made with the best intentions of neutrality and objectivity, bears the risk of offending those who are not mentioned.

23. It is obvious that neither parliaments nor media should sacrifice their professional methods; but a compromise can be found on the grounds of efficient and effective press services in parliaments. Parliamentary information officers' duty could be to prepare summaries of the debates or to highlight the main points on the agenda and to help journalists to have access to the whole text.

24. Even the quality press and serious TV and radio programmes cannot avoid this constraint, although they normally address a well-informed audience of opinion-forming leaders and decision-makers. Moreover, these represent a small chunk of the audience and consequently, the editions and broadcasts which try to stay away from political and economic influence, encounter big financial difficulties.

25. Judging by most television programmes and the newspapers with larger circulation, human beings have not changed since the world began; they seek sensation and amusement. However, artful ways of charming the public can create demands and tastes which do not occur naturally, and the selection may not be without guile.

26. Without going so far as to allege the creation of fashions for certain types of information, suffice it to say that there is intensive exploitation of real needs for diversion; this encroaches on the space which could be set aside for information and analyses equipping people to take a responsible attitude to the challenges encountered in their lives as citizens, parents, etc.

27. Is there no way of reconciling the oft-proclaimed ambition to enlighten public opinion with the concern for attractiveness? Now that media, and especially television, have become a prime agency of socialisation, they can hardly evade a duty to strike a balance between appealing programmes and an information programme freed from the fixation of scoops.

28. Fortunately indeed, there are some early signs of reaction. Condemnation by journalists themselves of the distortions or even fabrications which may sporadically occur in certain media, together with the expression of new needs for information inspired by a more discerning curiosity, augur well for an improvement in the situation. Surveys do in fact reveal a demand for dedicated channels which reflect this more discerning curiosity. The laws of the market-place which subjugate the media may change as the demand asserts itself.

29. The weight of political information depends on the originator's political weight. In most countries of Europe, the potential for decisive initiative in national policy action and decision-making is in the executive's hands.

30. Governments can assess the implications of the problems to be tackled and identify solutions thanks to a wealth of expertise which is held by their departments and is not generally available to parliaments.

31. Parliamentarians often deplore the difficult, sometimes almost impossible, access to information detained by the government. On the other hand, they often find themselves snowed under with paperwork by the executive. In such situations, they say, it is not easy to extract the really substantial matters.

32. The efficient parliamentary control over the executive is one of the basic functions with which parliament is empowered. The presence of the media during "question time" is essential for ensuring an efficient monitoring of the government action. The advantages of the executive, especially when the government enjoys the majority in parliament, exert a magnetic attraction on the media, which do not regard the parliaments as the deciding factor in political life.

33. Outside the government, furthermore, the political struggle centres on party leaders. This personalisation of the issues also tends to divert the attention which could be paid to parliament and to its members.

34. Should parliaments be one 100% open to the public? The degree of openness of parliamentary work varies considerably from one Council of Europe member state to another. Generally speaking, journalists in Central and Eastern Europe are more often faced with old-style practices of closed doors for parliamentary sittings.

35. The disadvantage of such practices today is that reporters are compelled to rely on parliamentarians to get the missing factual information. Whilst the opinion of the elected representatives about the outcome of a parliamentary debate is a precious source of public debate, they can hardly be relied upon for providing neutral facts. Moreover, most of the politicians tend to speak more wholeheartedly to representatives of media expressing their own political affiliations; this scarcely makes the information more objective.

36. The objections against entire openness are based on the fear of increased demagogy, with parliamentarians constantly debating before the TV cameras. Experience shows, also, that at in-camera meetings the ruling majority and the opposition sometimes come to some agreements that they would never consider publically. Lastly, defence and security matters are generally recognised as being subject to confidentiality. There is no consensus among different countries, though, as to what should be considered as a security or defence mater.

37. Another finding is that regular news from parliaments alone cannot guarantee tangible effects upon the way the Parliament is perceived by public opinion and the way it is likely to change in the future.

38. In some Central and Eastern European countries, indeed, the euphoria accompanying the initial broadcasts from the first democratically-elected parliaments was quickly replaced by a public disenchantment, nourished by the feelings that MPs were not doing anything but wrangling.

39. Openness is essential in a pluralistic democracy. Attention should be brought to the necessity of assessing the situation in different member states and of trying to apply some standards of minimum transparency as one of the criteria of democratic development. Openess must not be confined to parliamentary work. It also applies to all the activities carried out by public authorities. Examples of this transparency can be found in Nordic countries.

40. Public opinion, in general, seems to be sceptical about the way both politicians and journalists fulfil their role. Indeed, politicians as well as journalists serve public objectives, but sometimes they are both more preoccupied with their own survival than with the social needs. Demagogy can be inherent both to journalists and parliamentarians. So is the tendency towards exaggeration and scandal.

41. But these individual cases do not justify the right for some to state that media, as a whole, allegedly are an instrument of manipulation and that parliament, as a whole, allegedly is a useless institution.

42. In a democratic society, the political agenda should mainly de determined by politicians. They are the legitimate people's representatives and are thus accountable to their voters.

43. Science has proven, indeed, that the direct political impact of the media on the citizens' behaviour is not as strong as is normally claimed. Media only influence voter-behaviour to a very small extent, in comparison with personal convictions, contacts with opinion-leaders or reference groups.

44. But the real, though indirect, influence of the media lies in the fact that they replace parliaments in determining political topicality.

45. Now that parliaments have finally decided to pursue a policy of openness, the media are taking scarcely any notice of them. A growing part of the media sector is mainly concerned with making profits. The range of opinions to be found in the press is being stifled by the law of supply and demand. As parliaments have, moreover, lost much of their power to technocratic structures, they have become less interesting to the media. Furthermore, parliamentary affairs seldom meet the criteria which mainly determine whether a parliamentary development is worth reporting.

46. On average, 63% of all legislative proposals originate from the government and on average, too, their chances of success stand at 78% as against only 39% for private members' bills, which in addition often take three or four times longer to become law (Swaelen). As a result, parliament is in danger of becoming no more than a rubber stamp, where party discipline prevails over the personal convictions of individual MPs.

47. There are many theories about the future of media. Some predict the imminent death of the press and globalisation of television; more recently, some analysts have spotted a decrease in TV watching and return to written information.

48. In our opinion, it is impossible to make global predictions in the present situation of rapid and revolutionary changes. It is clear that in different periods different trends will prevail in society. What looks inevitable in the near future, however, is the boom of interactive communication, or media products on demand.

49. But this trend should not be over-estimated, either. It is unlikely for the ordinary citizen to spend hours with, for instance, interactive TV, although an initial period of 'obsessive" dealing with the new media is inevitable. But once the public has established some new reading/listening/watching patterns, it is likely to turn again to some "ready-made" products. The substantial difference is that these patterns will become much more flexible with the permanent on-going dialogue between media and their public.

50. In that situation, one can expect two opposite trends: 1/ of further "commercialisation" of political information and 2/ of expanding and deepening of public dialogue.

51. It is unrealistic to believe that the first trend can be avoided. What matters, is to reduce to the minimum the social impact of product-like news making.

52. The second trend finds at present practical realisation in the so-called public journalism, which has fervently been promoted since the end of the 1980s by some American journalists like Arthur Charity, Jay Rosen and David Merritt.

53. According to Rosen and Merritt, public journalism was born in a particular political and social context: "Journalists in the United States are at a critical point in the history of their craft. Threatened on one side by declining readership and new economic pressures in the media industry, they face, on another side, a different kind of threat from the fraying of community ties, the rising disgust with politics, and a spreading sense of impotence and hopelessness among Americans frustrated by the failures of their democratic system."

54. Another catalyst for the development of public journalism is the fact that media professionals feel more and more upset with the constant dilution of the ideal of objective journalism; on the other side, they realise that only deeper involvement in community life can bring a positive answer to their concerns for the future of their profession.

55. Writes Rosen: "Public journalism proposes a [...] dramatic change: a new compact between journalists and the public they serve, in which both parties recognize the duty of the press occasionally to intervene in public life in the interest of the strengthening civic culture. [...] It is to treat them as agents, participants, takers of responsibility [...] It is to hold them to a certain standard of citizenship, to listen and respond rather than condescendingly treasuring everything they say because it comes from ordinary people"

56. Public journalism in particular and, more generally, journalism which is deeply involved in citizens' problems and which searches for a dialogue with them on an equal footing, is unlikely to remain a purely American phenomenon. An example of this assumption is the French project for the creation of TCC, a cable and satellite TV programme which will be prepared by the ordinary people.

57. Such forms of journalism can make parliamentarians and journalists natural "allies" in the strive for closer contacts with the people, without depriving them of their particular duties and responsibilities.

58. Sometimes, parliaments find it difficult to accept that they should modernise their working and communication practices in order to capture public and especially media attention. The need to get closer to the people is quite wrongly associated with an alleged devaluation of the high parliamentary standards and giving up into the hands of the mass culture.

59. Attracting the attention of the media should, of course, in no way imply achieving this through any means. This is why it is so important to develop highly professional press information departments which can help both the public and the journalists to get rapid access to information.

60. Employing media professionals is essential. It is now well known that public persuasion is a highly complex process, in which rational and irrational elements exist on an equal footing. As a result, press counsellors today extensively use scientifically proven techniques of political marketing and electoral communication, by contrast to the traditional approach of the bureaucracy to "bleach" the information and to present it from the point of view of an insider.

61. The practice which consists of "guiding" the press is often regarded, quite rightly, as an attempt to manipulate it. It is preferable to maintain a spirit of openness and provide journalists with adequate, accurate information. Parliaments should not wait for journalists to ask questions, but should circulate information on their own initiative.

1. Better working conditions for journalists and greater availability of information

62. Almost all parliaments produce reviews, bulletins and other periodical publications which seek to provide more or less detailed coverage of parliamentary proceedings and to offer the public more direct and less technical information about official texts.

63. These publications should be designed at serving both in cases when journalists want to write their own stories and only need some basic factual support, and in those when some direct quotations are needed.

64. The parliamentary press services should try to adapt this kind of information to the specific needs of their interlocutors, taking into account the substantial difference between general information media and specialised press/programmes. Where a general information newspaper/magazine/radio or TV programme can only afford a few words about a particular debate, a specialised issue can examine a specific problem in depth.

65. Regrettably, some press services tend to concentrate all their efforts on communication through general information media, especially through those with large audiences and political influence. Specialised media and their potential of indirect influence on the public opinion, through separate groups of the population professionals, are sometimes neglected. At present, journalists from such media can even have problems in obtaining access to the parliamentary sittings.

66. Parliaments should therefore realise that being on the cover page of the most influential media is not the only criterion for successful work. It is equally important to involve in specific debates the relevant groups of the population. It is inconceivable, for instance, to ignore the professionals from the field of electricity, or the environmentalists, when debating on the improvement of safety standards in the nuclear plants, or not to pay special attention to the press or the programmes for elderly people when debating the reform of the pensions system.

67. With the extension of Internet, an increasing number of parliaments have created their own Web sites providing various types of information. The content varies as does the level of ambition. The policy of most national parliaments is to inform the general public at large about the work in parliament - generally, on the parliamentary agenda and some basic reports.

68. Some parliaments have more ambitious schemes: to allow all information available in electronic form to be made available also on the net and to connect the internal and external information on Internet. Some have gone beyond the purely "technical" aspect of information and give the general public the possibility of having a dialogue with their elected representatives through the Net.

69. Several international organisations, including the Council of Europe, also operate their own servers. The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has recently started its own Web site (http://stars.coe.fr) with information on the Assembly's work, composition, topical issues and latest news, as well as an electronic bulletin.

70. The Assembly should support and take an active part in the projects run by different international organization to use modern communication and information technologies, such as Internet, for the purpose of inter-parliamentary communication.

71. A meeting of the IPU Consultative Committee of Experts (1 December 1995, Geneva) pointed out that "national parliaments, for whom access to information has always been a critical factor, are particularly well placed to benefit from the increased information accessibility and transparency offered by the Internet. Because it is truly global, the Internet makes possible low-cost communications with people and organizations around the world, thus enhancing the visibility and accessibility of parliamentary institutions".

72. It is clear that the future of the representative democracy lies with the parliaments' ability to turn to more direct forms of communication with their electorate. Information highways offer a unique possibility of enhancing political dialogue and it is up to parliaments to find their place in the process of "electronic democracy".

73. An information report prepared for the Committee on Parliamentary and Public Relations by Mr CALDORO (Doc. 7106/94) established that at the moment all European parliaments broadcast (or permit the broadcasting of) their proceedings. However, committee meetings are generally held behind closed doors.

74. The widespread opinion is that broadcasting the full parliamentary debate is tantamount to respecting pluralism. Only full time TV coverage can give the electorate the ability to put television's selections and distortions into context. It is also stressed that it is furthermore preferable to combine it with the obvious need to develop a public affairs channel, for instance C Span, Americas' Cable Satellite Public Affairs Network, created in 1977 by the Cable Television industry.

75. A 1994 survey of five years televising the House of Commons in Britain has reached the following conclusions: after five years of broadcasting, "it is almost unimaginable that the cameras could ever be removed, despite the continuing small band of serious objectors. The vast majority of MPs are well aware of the personal benefits of televising, which means a higher profile in their constituency as well as the perceived wider public benefit in making parliamentary proceedings more accessible."

76. As to the creation of specialised parliamentary TV channels, the example has been set in Canada with CPAC, and in the USA with C Span, Americas' Cable Satellite Public Affairs Network, created in 1977 by the cable television industry to provide live coverage on the U.S. House of Representatives. In June 1986, C-SPAN 2 started telecasting the U.S. Senate daily sessions. C-SPAN has now grown into a combination of networks that provide diverse public affairs programming 24-hours-a-day. The cable industry continues to carry and fund all of the C-SPAN networks as a public service for cable television viewers across America.

C-SPAN defines its mission as a public service which provides access to the forums where public policy is discussed, debated and decided. It carries national party committee meetings, conventions, press conferences of all kinds, major public affairs events, lectures, university seminars. All without editing, commentary or analysis and with a balanced presentation of points of views.

77. A committee hearing in Paris in 1996 gave the Committee the opportunity of becoming acquainted with the German's ARD plan for a parliamentary news channel and with the experience of the French national Assembly (see AS/Parl (1996) 2). Some countries, like Sweden, are also considering the creation of such a channel.

78. The German current affairs channel, Phoenix, started up at the beginning of 1997. The channel's underlying concept is broader than that of C Span. Phoenix broadcasts via satellite from 8.00 am to 12.00 pm and provides information about politics, economics, culture and science. This includes debates in the German Bundestag, in the state parliaments and in the European Parliament. Parliamentary debates in other countries are also broadcast if the topics are of interest to the German viewer. In terms of its legal status and its organisation, Phoenix is a subsidiary of Germany's two public broadcasting companies, ARD and ZDF. Phoenix is financed by a share of the monthly radio and TV license fees.

79. The creation of a European TV parliamentary channel is not yet on the agenda. The position of the European Parliament is that it is better to provide information to the leading TV channels in Europe and to be present in their news.

80. As governments share responsibility with parliaments for the operation of democracy, it is their duty to foster the establishment of such channels and to envisage arrangements for funding, which they will have to bear fully or partially.

81. A key topic is the percentage of all the parliamentary information to which journalists can have access -by means of facilities provided by the parliaments' press services and at their own initiative. Not less important is the availability of "live" information and the percentage of news that journalists can only achieve within some time delay.

82. In pluralistic democracies journalists and media should have direct access to the parliamentary building and direct contacts with the parliamentarians in the corridors and in front of the Chamber. The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe is a good example of such openness.

83. Parliamentary activity must therefore be adapted, not because of the media but rather in the interests of working more efficiently as well as recovering its importance and relevance.

85. Many people, including journalists, are rebuffed by the jargon of legal texts produced by parliaments. It would be advisable to set up in parliaments a department staffed with linguists responsible for

86. Unconsciously, television and radio have contributed much to the improvement of the language of parliamentary debate, in terms of conciseness and expressiveness (although they have also created the personality of the "telecrat", a politician who is only interested in making effective interventions before the cameras). The less gifted speakers, however, should receive training in the use of the media, in the same way as such courses are organised for business people. Only a few parliaments have recourse to such practice for the moment.

87. Parliamentary questions, questions and other points of interest to the media should be tabled for the morning or the early afternoon. More effort should be put into keeping the timetable.

88. It is uncertain whether a better communication policy suffices to promote greater media interest in parliamentary work; parliament's political leverage in the decision-making process needs to be accentuated.

89. How can this be achieved? The reply is not to be inferred from the respective national constitutional provisions which define varying degrees of parliamentary power. At best, the answer lies in the adoption of certain codes of practice. Personalisation of politics around a small nucleus of leaders is an obstacle to revived media and citizen interest in parliaments. Among other examples, government-planned initiatives should first be disclosed in parliament rather than to the media, a practice which is seldom observed. The government's respect for parliamentary prerogatives is a precondition for workable relations between the political power and the media.

90. In the present situation, parliamentary activities do not attract media attention, which is harmful to society. It contributes to further citizens' alienation from political life and the emergence of other methods of communication between politicians and their electorate; methods which often are far from the principles of democratic legitimacy.

91. The relations between parliaments and media can and must be improved. The absolute necessity of modernization of the parliamentary communication policy would not suffice if parliaments do not rethink their role in society. Such a parliamentary reform should start at the initiative of the members of parliament who, because of their regular meetings with the electorate, are the best placed to identify the communication problems and to suggest solutions.

92. As to the press, it is natural to believe that those journalists and media who believe in the noble function of the journalistic profession, will take further steps in order to bring the political debate closer to everyday life of the citizens. Journalists are the best mediators between politicians and their electorate; they can do a lot to organize face-to-face meetings between elected members of parliaments and the ordinary people.

93. The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has an important role to play in the process of making parliamentary work more "public". Regular meetings between politicians, information departments' officers in parliaments, journalists, communication professionals, NGOs, political scientists and other experts can facilitate the needed communication reforms in parliaments.

Members of the committee: MM. Jansson (Chairman) (Alternate: Laakso), Kelam (Vice-Chairman), Mrs Arnold, Mr Berceanu, Sir Andrew Bowden, MM. Brennan, Bugli, Mrs Bušic, MM. Cardona, Christodoulides, Colombier, Dagys, Diacov, Dzasokhov, Horn, Eversdijk, Mrs Fernandez de la Vega, Mr Fogaš (Alternate: Fico), Mr Gross, Mrs Grzeskowiak, MM. Henry (Alternate: Staes), Hughes (Alternate: Cunliffe), Jonsson, Kelemen, Kotlar, Koulouris, Külahli, Lauricella, Lekberg, Likhachev (Alternate: Ryabov), Loutfi (Alternate: Ivanov), Lummer, Martins (Alternate: Pereira Marques), Mignon, Minarolli, Moser, Mrs Nistad, MM. Pahor, Pantelejevs, Regenwetter, Samofalov , Speroni, Svoboda, N... (Alternate: Brunhart).