Dr. Frank-Dieter Freiling the Chairperson of the Eurovision Song Contest Reference Group has confirmed that the Big Five is here to stay.

Speaking to Dr Eurovision in a Facebook live stream, Dr. Frank-Dieter Freiling has given his thoughts on the Big Five rule. The rule which was introduced in 2000, has seen France, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom automatically qualify for the Grand Final regardless of results.

The Big Four was expanded to the Big Five in 2011 when Italy returned to the contest. The rule is based on the broadcasters making the largest financial contributions to the European Broadcasting Union. Dr Frank-Dieter Freiling explained that;

We need to make sure that the budget for the Eurovision Song Contest is balanced, and the major part of televotes is coming from the big countries. The rule was implemented to make sure that the majority of spectators and thus the majority of televoters who live in the big countries can enjoy the show and take part in the voting process, and I think that this has proven to be a good solution.

The rule according to Mr Freiling is not going to be removed anytime soon. However there is the possibility of expansion of the rule to encompass more countries, he added;

Of course one could consider countries like Turkey or Russia to be “big countries” as well, and we are discussing this topic regularly, but this does not put the whole rule into question.

Turkey who last participated in the Eurovision Song Contest in 2012, has previously cited the Big Five rule as one of the reasons for withdrawing from the competition. At the time TRT argued that the rule was unfair, as all other nations excluding the Big Five and Host Nation had to go through the semi-finals.

You can watch the full interview here.

Source: Dr Eurovision