Full text of the General Law of Audiovisual Communication

The Official State Gazette publishes the new law that will establish the regulatory framework for audiovisuals, create the State Media and Audiovisual Council and establish the right of operators to launch pay channels, limiting it to 50 percent of the channels granted to each license. Published on April 1, it will come into force on May 1.

The new Law 7/2010, of March 31, General Audiovisual Communication, appears published in the Official State Gazette (BOE) of April 1, setting its entry into force for May 1, 2010. The text, after years of negotiations, establishes a general framework for the development of the audiovisual sector, subject today to a multitude of partial regulations and self-regulation codes. In addition, it lays the foundations for the creation of a supervisory body, the State Audiovisual Media Council (CEMA).

The new law will provide legal certainty to companies to be able to act by differentiating between the regime of granting, leasing, assignment, renewal or termination of audiovisual licenses. Likewise, it gives the green light for operators to launch pay channels, limiting it to 50 percent of the channels granted to each license.

One of the aspects that the new text emphasizes is advertising, which will be twenty minutes per hour (instead of the 29 initially planned by the Government) between conventional advertisements (12 minutes), self-promotion (five minutes) and telepromotion (three minutes). Regarding the protection of minors, it establishes that content that may be “harmful to the physical, mental or moral development of minors may only be broadcast between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m., and must always be preceded by an acoustic and visual warning,” excluding advertisements such as those for alcoholic beverages from this schedule. It also requires television stations to include special digital coding in their broadcasts for parental control.

Access to the full text.