The Vice-President of the European Commission responsible for Values and Transparency, Věra Jourová, took the opportunity of a hearing of the Civil Liberties Committee (LIBE) in the European Parliament on Wednesday 19 February to inform MEPs of “the development of her thoughts” on the Action Plan for Democracy in Europe (see EUROPE 12416/3).
The aim of this plan, she said, is to respond to the many challenges facing our democracies, such as interference in elections, disinformation, and the issue of media pluralism.
The Commissioner has announced, in particular, that a conference will be held on 20 March on this subject. This meeting, devoted to the role of the media in our democracies, should make it possible to “examine the main conclusions of the results of the monitoring of media pluralism”, she said.
Mrs Jourová stressed this point, saying that it was necessary “to make citizens media literate” and to “vaccinate our societies” against the virus of disinformation. “We need to increase our ability to detect this trend”, she said, adding that the Commission will work on this with its team in the European External Action Service (EEAS), with STRATCOM, and with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).
“Lying is one thing”, she said, but the real problem is when people believe it. On the contrary, several MEPs in their responses stressed the responsibility of certain political figures in this area.
Dutch MEP Sophia in 't Veld, speaking on behalf of the Renew Europe group, pointed to a “major omission” on the part of the Commissioner, denouncing the behaviour of European heads of state and government that lead to ‘fake news’. “If we don’t have the courage to tackle this, we will undermine our own credibility”, she lamented.
Mrs Jourová recalled that her Action Plan for Democracy should also lead to more accountability and responsibility on the part of digital platforms in order to better understand information campaigns and bubbles created by lack of transparency.
“If we want these platforms to be more accountable, I think we have to go through the regulation on algorithms, on transparency”, reacted Jeroen Lenaers (EPP, Netherlands).
The plan should also address the need for rules on political advertising and the financing of political parties in Europe.
Furthermore, at the hearing, the Commissioner invited the members of the LIBE Committee to participate in the revision of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). She hopes that the latter can be applied consistently, without the need for a “complete overhaul”.
However, the day before Mrs Jourová’s intervention, the European Data Protection Board published its contribution to the European Commission’s inquiry into the review of the GDPR and indicated on Twitter that it still considers a revision of GDPR to be premature. (Original version in French by Agathe Cherki – intern)