The industry organization Tidningsutgivarna has long considered that SVT has too long news texts on its site.

This means, according to TU, that SVT as a public service company competes with commercial newspapers because they publish the same news material.

TU's CEO Johan Taubert believes that the issue has become more important as advertising revenues have decreased dramatically in recent years, and the subscription model - with locked articles online - has become more important.

Then, according to Taubert, it will be a problem that Swedes can read news for free on SVT's website.

- SVT is turning a blind eye to the daily press' opportunity to build a digital reader store, he tells TT.

Want to see change

Now Tidningsutgivarna wants to see a regulation of SVT's opportunities to publish written text online, in the new broadcasting license that will extend from 2026 to 2033.

In Finland, the government has recently introduced such a restriction for the country's public service company Yle.

This was done after the Finnish Media Association, the country's equivalent of TU, ​​submitted a complaint to the European Commission that Yle's web articles violated EU rules.

In Denmark, the private media industry association has now reported Danmarks Radio for the same thing, but there the issue has not yet been decided.

In the future, Yle's articles will mainly be linked to video content.

TU wants to see a similar change for SVT in Sweden, otherwise they are prepared to go the same way and report to the EU Commission.

- The threat is real, says Johan Taubert to SVT.

- If we go that way, we would not be the first.

The EU gave Finland the right, and Denmark has followed the same path.

SVT's CEO: "Industry problems"

SVT's CEO Hanna Stjärne believes that there is no contradiction between strong public and strong private news actors online.

- Extensive research has shown that a strong and accessible news offering is important in a country.

It strengthens the interest in news and benefits all news actors, says Stjärne to TT.

Compared with other Nordic public service companies, SVT works significantly more with video.

At the same time, the news programs in traditional television have a high average age and the website is needed to reach a younger target group, according to Stjärne.

- This is an industry problem and an industry issue.

The younger news consumers are primarily digital, and SVT has had a digital news service since digitalisation began.

We would not be able to carry out the mission without it.