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Berlusconi TV fined for bias

John Hooper

Opinion polls show greater support for Romano Prodi

Rome: Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's television group was on Monday ordered to pay a Euro 250,000-fine for repeatedly favouring its proprietor in the Italian general election campaign.

The fine was announced by Italy's independent Communications Authority as Mr Berlusconi braced himself for an on-screen duel with Opposition leader Romano Prodi, widely seen as his last chance to stave off defeat.

The debate was expected to focus on the economy and, in particular, a Centre-Left plan for reducing social security contributions. Mr Berlusconi, trailing by up to five percentage points in the polls, has claimed the pledge can only be funded with higher taxes.

The fine was the fourth time this year that the Prime Minister's TV empire, Mediaset, has been penalised for bias. The campaign alone has cost it Euro 500,000. However, an Opposition representative on the board of the public broadcaster RAI compared the fines to ``a packet of cigarettes'' for Mr Berlusconi, who was last year ranked by Forbes magazine as the 25th richest individual in the world.

Monitoring by watchdog

The latest sanction was imposed on Rete4, one of Mediaset's three channels. The TV watchdog had ordered it to rebalance its coverage after imposing a Euro 200,000 fine on March 22. It said further monitoring had detected no sign of a change.

Rete4's evening news is routinely and blatantly biased in favour of the Prime Minister. When Rete4 was first penalised, another Berlusconi channel, Italia1, was fined Euro 100,000 for bias. None of RAI's channels, including RAI3 which is often accused of favouring the Left, has been censured since campaigning began.

Despite the extra television coverage, opinion polls held after the first of two TV debates in mid-March showed a majority of voters believed it had been won by Mr Prodi, a former European Commission President. By the time an opinion polling ban took effect on March 25, the Centre-Left was leading by 3.5 to 5 points.

The ban has made it impossible to gauge the impact of a row over tax following Mr Prodi's outlining of a plan for raising cash by levelling tax rates on investment returns at 20 per cent.

This would mean cutting taxes on some investments, but increasing them on others that form the core savings of most Italian families.

Mr Prodi acknowledged at the weekend that his side had mishandled the issue. ``It was a mistake, an error of communication,'' he said.

- Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006

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