No Billag Initiative - February 2018

We discussed the No Billag Initiative on the show, an initiative which will come to a vote on March 4th, 2018. Here's the pro-initiative website - and here's one of the opponents' websites. Billag is the company that has up to now been collecting the licence fee for Swiss National Television. The initiative wants to get rid of licence fees altogether, and wants TV or radio licences to be sold to the highest bidder. If the No Billag initiative gets through, free speech, independence, diversity and the regional focus of local broadcasters could disappear. Solidarity and democracy will be affected if only a few very rich media companies are able to broadcast their populist opinions without restriction or opposition. Radio X itself gets 55% of its budget through Billag fees. So if the initiative gets through, that means that Radio X will lose half its budget and will effectively have to shut down many of its shows. In other words: No Billag - No English Show!