On September 7, TF1 sued Canal+ before the Paris Commercial Court to demand that the latter restore the signal on its TF1, TMC, TFX, LCI, TF1 Séries Films channels and its My TF1 service at least on the distribution service of DTT via satellite which serves the 2 million French households in mountainous areas.
The Minister of Culture Rima Abdul Malak had herself sent a letter to the Canal+ group stating that
"cutting off the signal of the TF1 group's channels on the TNT Sat offer deprives people who can only receive DTT by satellite of any access to the five free channels of the TF1 group
”.
But today, the Paris Commercial Court decided to dismiss the TF1 group.
The court advances two arguments.
The first is that Arcom, the audiovisual regulator, has itself recognized that
“the law does not provide legal leverage to compel operators to remedy this harmful situation
”.
The second is that the two contracts;
the one on the TNT Sat platform and the one on the TNT platform are linked.
So, if the two parties have not reached a commercial agreement to extend the two contracts beyond August 31, 2022, Canal+ cannot be forced to distribute TF1 channels on the TNT Sat platform alone.
Dismissed, the TF1 group stresses that it will appeal this decision.