France Télévisions chief warns funding gap threatens cultural broadcasting model

Delphine Ernotte Cunci, president of France Télévisions, highlighted the difficulty of fulfilling the broadcaster’s mandate amid ongoing budget cuts and the absence of a signed objectives and means contract for the 2026-2028 period. She explained that the State’s latest funding reduction leaves the public media group with a shortfall, prompting a shift from extensive staff reductions to trimming programme output. This approach would also curtail spending on new audiovisual productions, she warned, potentially destabilising the French cultural exception that the public service model has historically protected. The contract, expected since June, remains under discussion at the Ministry of Culture, leaving the broadcaster in a state of financial uncertainty.