LONDON (Brand Republic) - German media group Kirch has started legal proceedings to annul UK laws restricting it from selling the UK broadcasting rights to the World Cup football tournament to a pay-TV group.
Current UK legislation states the World Cup, along with the Olympics, Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Tournament and the Grand National, must be available for all to watch on free-to-air TV.
However, Kirch is trying to raise around £170m from the sale of the UK rights of the World Cup in 2002 and 2006. Kirch bought the European rights to the tournament from football鈥檚 governing body Fifa for £570m.
UK terrestrial broadcasters ITV and BBC, which each paid £4m to screen the competition in 1998, are refusing to pay such amounts for future competitions.
Sky Sports is not allowed to bid for the rights because of the legislative restrictions. However, Vic Wakeling, managing director of Sky Sports, said BSkyB would not bid for the rights even if it was allowed to, because he believes the price Kirch is asking is too high.
Wakeling also said BSkyB would not be used by Kirch 鈥渂ecause it has overvalued the European rights for the event without doing its homework鈥.
Kirch is asking the EU to annul ratification of the UK list of protected sports events, which includes the World Cup.
Kirch claims the EU had no legal right to ratify the list and that it [Kirch] was not consulted by the UK government about which events were to be protected.
The department for culture, media and sport said it was confident the ratification of the list would stand up to legal scrutiny.