"Perseverance is rewarded sooner or later - but usually later," Wilhelm Busch already knew.

And the federal states are demonstrating perseverance with their reform of public service broadcasting.

Six years after the formation of the working group "Broadcasters' Mission and Structural Optimization", a draft of the amended Interstate Media Treaty is available, which the heads of government could adopt on June 2nd.

The "structural optimization" is obsolete, but at least the "order" should be optimized.

“We must now finally come to a conclusion of the deliberations.

The arguments have been exchanged, the time is ripe for decisions.

Since 2016 we have been looking for countries for the royal road.

Extending the discussion will not help to improve the result," says Dirk Schrödter (CDU), head of the State Chancellery in Schleswig-Holstein.

The broadcasters would have to report their financial needs for the next contribution period in the spring of 2023 to the Kef fee commission.

That only makes sense if the reform is “done and wrapped up” by then.

The planned changes relate to six of the 23 paragraphs in the State Media Treaty on public service broadcasting.

The Broadcasting Commission's draft of May 23 differs little from the paper that was put up for discussion in an online hearing.

The importance of entertainment is also disputed.

The draft from November 2021 states: “Entertainment that corresponds to a public service profile is part of the mandate.” The new draft states: “The public service offers have to inform, educate, advise, cultural content mediate and [to entertain/should also entertain].

As far as they entertain, they should correspond to a particular degree with a public service profile.” If the states agree on this, ARD and ZDF will hardly have to change anything about the entertainment abundance.

The order in its "entire breadth"

The order should be "perceptible in its entire breadth on the first selection level of its own portals and at all times of the day in the full programs." In other words: not only crime thrillers and shows, but also documentaries must be present in the main evening program.

Films and series of European and non-European origin should only be available in the media libraries for 30 days “if they are contributions to education or culture and they make a particular contribution to the public profile.” To comply with the order To be able to check better, the broadcasters should set targets.

In addition, the countries would like better cost transparency, which should make it easier for the KEF to “review the financial requirements”.

"Contribution acceptance" and "contribution stability" are the goals of the reform, says the head of the Kiel State Chancellery, Schrödter.

Nothing has changed about that.

However, contribution stability does not automatically mean that the contribution remains unchanged.

According to the Hamburg Senator for Culture, Carsten Brosda (SPD), before such a debate can be started in a "targeted" way, it is necessary for the federal states to define the precise mandate.

“In this respect, the countries have made a conscious decision to treat the debates on the mandate and financing separately.

Only after this process has been completed will the federal states, in a second phase, discuss questions of contribution financing in more depth,” said Brosda.