The Dutch government was giving state aid to public broadcasters when it made ad hoc payments to the NPO between 1994 and 2005, the European court of justice said on Thursday.

The Dutch system of funding its public broadcasting sector ‘constitutes state aid which is incompatible with the common market,’ the court said in a statement.
And the court ordered ‘the amount of €76.327m, plus interest, must therefore be recovered by the Netherlands from the Netherlands radio and television association (NPO).’
Repayments
An NPO spokesman told the NRC the money had already been repaid several years ago.
The European Commission began investigating the Dutch public broadcasting system following complaints from commercial broadcasters in 2002 and 2003.
Public broadcasting is funded by a combination of government cash and advertising revenue.