New law to force Dutch public broadcasters to be financially more transparent

State Secretary Sander Dekker of Media wants to add an obligation to the new Media Law that will force public broadcasters to be transparent about costs like top salaries and football rights if politicians ask for it, he said to the Telegraaf on Tuesday.

Dekker believes that the public broadcasters' spending must be checkable because it is public money.

The public broadcasters are against this idea. They argue that journalistic independence could be put at stake and that the information is competition-sensitive.

Dekker has been working on the introduction of a new Media Act for some time.