APPROVED by
Decision No SPR-13 of
the General Meeting of Shareholders of the Media Support Fund
of 25 April 2024
RULES OF PROCEDURE FOR THE EXPERTS OF THE MEDIA SUPPORT FUND
CHAPTER I
GENERAL PROVISIONS
1. The Rules of Procedure of the Experts of the Media Support Fund (hereinafter – the Fund) (hereinafter – the Rules) establish the procedure for the establishment and organization of the work of the groups of experts (hereinafter – the Experts) providing expert evaluation services to the Fund for the projects, activities and grant applications of producers and/or disseminators of public information (hereinafter – the Experts), as well as the rights, duties and responsibilities of the Experts in the process of their evaluation and rendering their opinions on the projects, activities and grant applications of the public information producers and/or disseminators financed and administered by the Fund.
2. The experts shall be guided in their activities by the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania, the Law on Public Information of the Republic of Lithuania (hereinafter referred to as “the Law”), the Rules for Submission of Projects Financed by the Media Support Fund approved by the Minister of Culture of the Republic of Lithuania (hereinafter referred to as “the Rules”), the Rules of Procedure, the Decisions of the Council of the Fund, and any other legal acts.
3. The experts shall base their activities on the principles of professionalism, objectivity, independence, impartiality, transparency, honesty, confidentiality, reasonableness, legality, equality and collegiality.
4. Terms used in the Regulations shall have the same meaning as defined in the Act and the Rules.
CHAPTER II
RIGHTS, DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES OF EXPERTS
5. The experts shall evaluate the applications for projects, activities and grants submitted to the Fund by producers and/or disseminators of public information (hereinafter referred to as “the application”) and shall submit their conclusions to the Fund Board. In assessing the applications, the experts shall be guided by the provisions of Chapter IX of the Rules, the evaluation criteria set out in the Rules, the aims and objectives of the programme concerned, the conditions for funding the projects and the available knowledge, in accordance with their own internal conviction based on a comprehensive and objective examination of the data submitted to them in the applications.
6. The experts have the right:
6.1. to independently choose the methods and techniques for the evaluation of applications, provided that they do not conflict with the provisions of the Rules and point 5 of the Regulation;
6.2. receive applications, documents related to the applications and other information necessary for the evaluation and for the provision of the conclusions in due time from the Fund’s administration;
6.3. participate in the Fund’s Board meetings;
6.4. make comments, proposals and/or queries at the meetings of the expert group;
6 .5. receive remuneration for the work of the expert.
7. The experts have to:
7.1. to evaluate applications and present their conclusions in a timely manner in accordance with the Rules and Regulations;
7.2. to prepare for and attend the meetings of the Expert Group;
7 .3. before taking up their duties, sign the contract for the provision of expert evaluation services, the declaration of impartiality and the confidentiality undertaking in the prescribed form, and declare their private interests in accordance with the procedure laid down in the Law on the Harmonisation of Public and Private Interests of the Republic of Lithuania;
7 .4. act honestly, impartially, and in a manner that avoids conflicts of interest, and, in the case of a threat of a conflict of interest, recuse themselves in accordance with the procedure laid down in point 23 of the Regulations.
8. An expert shall be removed from the list of experts of the Fund and his/her contract shall be terminated before the expiry of his/her term of office on the following grounds :
8.1. on the grounds set out in the Selection of Experts;
8.2. if he/she fails to perform or does not properly perform the duties set out in the Regulations;
8.3. if he/she breaches the provisions of the undertaking of confidentiality or the declaration of impartiality. An expert who has been removed from the list of experts of the Fund for breaching the provisions of the declaration of impartiality and/or the undertaking of confidentiality shall not be allowed to provide expert evaluation services to the Fund unless two years have elapsed since the decision to remove him/her was taken;
8.4. if he/she is absent from more than two consecutive meetings of the panel of experts without a justifiable reason;
8.5. on the grounds set out in point 25 of the Regulation;
8.6. on the grounds set out in point 30 of the Regulation.
CHAPTER III
CONSTITUTION OF EXPERT GROUPS
9. The experts shall evaluate the applications and deliver their conclusions in expert groups (hereinafter referred to as the “expert group”), which shall be set up by decision of the Fund Board. The panels shall be composed of at least three experts.
10. Where more than 100 applications are submitted for a single programme financed and administered by the Fund (hereinafter referred to as ‘the Programme’) approved under the Rules, 11. the Fund Board may set up several expert groups for the same Programme, according to:
11 .1. the aims and objectives of the Programme as set out in the Rules of the Conditions of Financing of the Programme;
11 .2. the competence of the expert;
11.3. the number of experts set out in the Annexes to the Rules;
11 .4. the number of applications;
11.5. the principle of impartiality:
11.6. the age of the expert, in order to ensure a diversity of age groups among the members of the panel of experts;
11 .7. the gender of the expert, in order to ensure gender equality within the panel of experts.
12. The experts on the Fund’s list of experts shall be assigned to expert groups by programme in the following order:
12.1. Experts are selected on the basis of the competences required for the programme, based on the experience recorded in the Applicants’ questionnaires, taking into account:
12.1.1. the expert’s curriculum vitae;
12 .1.2. the expert’s education, operational and professional experience;
12 .1.3. the expert’s experience in expert evaluation;
12 .1.4. the expert’s position and possible links to producers and/or disseminators of public information;
12.2. priority shall be given to experts who:
12.2.1. have not participated in the activities of an expert group during their term in group;
12 .2.2. have not been appointed from the Fund’s list of experts to another expert group during the same competition;
12 .3. experts whose appointment would violate the principle of impartiality shall be excluded from the experts selected.
13. In the event that more than half of the members of the expert group withdraw from the consideration of the question assigned to the expert group after the establishment of the expert group, or in the case provided for in point 30 of the Regulations, or for other reasons if less than half of the members of the expert group remain in the expert group, the Fund Board shall, by a decision of the Fund Board, appoint to the group of experts from the list of experts, an expert with at least as much expertise as the majority of the experts who have withdrawn, in accordance with the provisions of points 11 and 12 of the Regulation.
14. The mandate of an expert as a member of an expert group shall begin upon appointment to the expert group in accordance with the procedure laid down in the Regulation and shall end upon the conclusion of a funding agreement between the Fund and the applicant, but in any event not later than the last day of the term of office for which he/she has been included on the Fund’s list of experts.
CHAPTER IV
ORGANISATION OF EXPERT GROUPS
15. The activities of the Expert Group shall be supervised and technically serviced by a member of staff appointed by the Fund’s administration (hereinafter referred to as “the Fund’s staff”). The Fund’s staff member shall prepare the meetings, take minutes of the meetings, sign the minutes of the meetings and maintain other documentation.
16. The experts’ conclusions on the applications shall be approved at the meeting of the expert group (hereinafter referred to as the meeting). Meetings may be organised in two ways: with all the experts present in person, or remotely by means of telecommunication, where it is possible to identify the experts present at the meeting.
17. The experts hearing is valid when there participates:
17.1. at least two experts, in the case of a group of three experts;
17.2. at least three experts, in the case of a group of four or five experts.
18. Each expert group selects an expert group leader who:
18.1. organise and be responsible for the work of the expert group;
18.2. convene the meetings of the expert group, approve the agendas of the meetings, chair the meetings, sign the minutes of the expert group and other documents related to the activities of the expert group;
18 .3. represent the expert group at the meetings of the Fund Board.
19. The head of the Expert Group shall be elected by a simple majority of the members of the Expert Group at the first meeting of the Expert Group by an open ballot. In the absence or temporary incapacity of the head of the panel, the functions of the head of the panel shall be performed by another member of the panel elected at the meeting.
20. The Fund’s staff member, on the instructions of the panel leader, shall inform the members of the panel of the planned date of the meeting by e-mail at least 3 working days before the meeting and shall provide the agenda of the meeting and any other necessary material. Any member of the panel who is unable to attend the panel meeting must inform the Fund’s staff member immediately.
21. The decision of the Expert Group shall be adopted by a simple majority of the members of the Expert Group present at the meeting. In the event of an equality of votes among the members of the expert group, the vote of the chairperson of the expert group or, in the absence of the chairperson of the expert group, the vote of the other member elected by the expert group to act in his/her capacity, shall be decisive. In the event that the meeting is not quorate, a reconvened meeting of the expert group shall be convened no later than 2 working days later.
22. The decision of the Panel shall be recorded in the minutes of the meeting. The minutes shall be signed by the head of the expert group or, in his/her absence, by another member of the expert group and by a member of the staff of the Fund.
22.1. the date of the meeting;
22.2. the registration number of the minutes;
22 .3. the expert who chaired the meeting, the secretary of the meeting and the members of the expert group present at the meeting;
22.4. the agenda of the meeting;
22 .5. a description of the discussion of each item on the agenda;
22 .6. the results of the voting, the decisions taken in the light of the results of the voting;
22.7. the conclusions of the experts;
22.8. the Application Evaluation Tables completed by the experts;
22 .9. any other relevant information recording the matters discussed at the meeting or the proceedings of the meeting.
23. If it becomes apparent that the evaluation of the application(s) submitted to him/her may give rise to a potential conflict of interest for the expert, the expert shall, on his/her own initiative, immediately withdraw from the evaluation of
all applications and from any decision on them in the relevant Fund Programme:
23.1. before the start of the individual evaluation of the applications, if the potential conflict of interest becomes apparent from the examination of the list of the applications submitted for evaluation. The expert must inform in writing the member of staff designated by the Fund’s administration, who is responsible for the activities of the expert group and who provides technical support to the Fund’s administration, of his/her disqualification within 3 working days of the date on which the applications are submitted to him/her for individual evaluation;
23 .2. after starting the evaluation of the application(s), if the potential conflict of interest becomes apparent only during the evaluation of the application(s). The expert must inform in writing the member of staff designated by the Fund’s administration and responsible for the technical support of the expert group in writing of his/her disqualification on the same day that the circumstances giving rise to a potential conflict of interest become apparent;
23.3. at the latest 3 working days before the meeting of the expert group, in the event that new circumstances giving rise to a potential conflict of interest have arisen after the end of the individual evaluation of the applications. The expert must inform in writing the member of staff designated by the Fund’s administration who is responsible for the activities of the panel and who provides technical support to the panel.
24. If a member of the panel does not recuse himself or herself or refuses to recuse himself or herself from the evaluation and/or decision-making process of an application which may give rise to a conflict of interest, the recusal of the expert shall be voted on in accordance with the procedure laid down in point 21 of the Regulations. The member of the panel shall not take part in the vote on his/her removal. The recusal or suspension of a member of the panel shall be noted in the minutes of the meeting. Where a decision to remove a member of the panel is taken, any data or assessments submitted by the removed member of the panel in relation to the application under consideration prior to the adoption of the decision shall be excluded.
25. In order to ensure compliance with the principles set out in point 3 of the Regulation and the conditions laid down in the declaration of impartiality and the undertaking of confidentiality, the Fund’s administration shall continuously monitor the work of the experts. If the Fund’s staff member observes that an expert does not comply with the above principles or conditions, as well as possible bias in the expert’s assessment, a review of the expert’s performance may be carried out on the initiative of the Director of the Fund. If the review of the expert’s performance confirms the above-mentioned circumstances, the expert shall be removed from the composition of the expert group and removed from the list of the Fund’s experts, and the expert’s evaluations shall be removed if no final decisions have been taken on the outcome of the Fund’s call for proposals. The Fund’s administration shall inform the head of the expert panel and the President of the Fund Board of the circumstances referred to in this point.
CHAPTER V
PROCEDURES FOR THE EVALUATION OF APPLICATIONS AND FOR THE SUBMISSION OF CONCLUSIONS
26. The Fund’s staff member shall electronically submit the applications to the members of the panel for their individual assessment. The applications shall be accompanied by the Application Evaluation Table (hereinafter referred to as the ‘Evaluation Table’), as well as the legislation governing the evaluation of the applications.
27. During the peer review, applications shall be scored according to the evaluation criteria set out in Annex 5 to the Rules.
28. Within a time limit set by the Fund’s staff member, the panel member shall evaluate all the applications submitted to him/her, complete the evaluation grid and submit it to the Fund’s staff member. The panellist shall enter in the evaluation table the scores for each evaluation criterion and his/her comments in relation to the evaluation criteria and the scores assigned to them. The duly completed evaluation matrix shall be submitted electronically to the Fund’s staff member.
29. The Fund’s staff member shall verify the conformity of the data contained in the evaluation tables submitted by the members of the panel with the requirements laid down in the Rules and the Regulation, no later than 5 working days after receipt of the evaluation tables.
30. If the Fund’s staff member finds deficiencies in the evaluation table submitted by a member of the expert group (scores are not entered or do not correspond to the values laid down in the legislation; comments are missing or inadequate, etc.), he/she shall electronically indicate these deficiencies to the member of the expert group and shall set a deadline for their correction of
no more than 3 working days. Failure to remedy the deficiencies within the time limit set by the Fund’s staff member shall result in the removal of the panelist’s rating for the applications found to be deficient, except in cases where such applications represent one fifth or more of the applications submitted to the panel for evaluation, in which case the panelist’s rating for all applications shall be removed and the panelist shall be removed from the panel and the Fund’s list of experts. An expert with at least the same level of expertise as that of the excluded expert shall be appointed to the panel by decision of the Fund Board from the Fund’s list of experts. The appointment of the expert shall be subject to the provisions of points 11 and 12 of the Regulation.
31. The data in the evaluation table, duly completed, are final and cannot be altered.
32. The Fund’s staff member shall, in accordance with the provisions of Chapter IX of the Rules, draw up the experts’ conclusions before the first meeting of the expert group:
32.1. a list of projects for which the experts propose to award funding in their evaluation tables, indicating the amount of funding to be allocated;
32.2. a list of projects for which the experts propose not to award funding in their evaluation tables.
33. The conclusions of the experts shall be submitted by the Fund’s staff member to the meeting of the expert group for consideration.
34. The panel shall decide at the meeting on the validation of the data contained in the experts’ conclusions and shall prepare a consolidated panel commentary for each application, which shall be prepared taking into account the application’s evaluation priorities, the evaluation criteria and the scores awarded.
35. The conclusions drawn up by the panel shall be signed by the panel leader and presented to the Fund Board at its meeting. In the event that the panel leader is unable to attend the meeting of the Fund Board, the expert conclusions shall be presented by another member of the panel. All members of the expert group shall be entitled to be present at the Fund Board meeting when the conclusions of the expert group are presented. The conclusions of the expert group submitted to the Fund Board may be made public.
CHAPTER VI
FINAL PROVISIONS
36. The Fund shall keep the documents of the experts’ activities in accordance with the procedure established by the Law on Documents and Archives of the Republic of Lithuania and its implementing legal acts.
37. Personal data received by the Fund and the experts in the performance of their functions shall be processed in accordance with Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and repealing Directive 95/46/EC (the “General Data Protection Regulation”), as well as with other legal acts regulating the protection of personal data and the processing thereof.
38. The Fund shall have the right to process personal data in the context of the selection of experts and the organisation of the work of the experts by the Fund Board.
39. The rights of data subjects shall be exercised in accordance with the procedures laid down by the General Data Protection Regulation and the Fund’s administration.