Shakeup ahead for public broadcasting
Public broadcasting is to benefit from a Labour-NZ First-Green government, a lobby group says, and it is not too concerned which of the plans proposed by Labour and NZ First is taken forward.
Labour’s election policy was to boost Radio New Zealand’s role in the media market and pay for it to launch a television channel.
Before the election the party’s broadcasting spokeswoman, Clare Curran, said that policy would likely see Radio NZ get the bulk of an additional $38 million a year that Labour would allocate to public broadcasting.
NZ First proposed removing all advertising from Television New Zealand’s TVNZ 1 channel and funding it instead from an increase in the Telecommunications Development Levy.
The levy, which is currently paid by phone companies, would be extended to commercial broadcasters and internet-television companies such as Netflix.
Myles Thomas, director of Better Public Media, previously known as the Coalition for Better Broadcasting, said Labour’s and NZ First’s policies were ‘‘essentially quite similar’’.
Both aimed to create a noncommercial public service media platform that included at least one television channel, he said.
But the lobby group had preferred NZ First’s policy because it included ‘‘sustainable and arm’s length funding for media’’.
Thomas said he looked forward to an improvement after ‘‘nine years of slow destruction of public broadcasting and media in New Zealand’’.
‘‘While the National Government has overseen the closure of TVNZ 7, loss of quality television documentaries, evening current affairs plus much more, and the slow strangulation of Radio New Zealand and NZ on Air – the new Government marks a turning
point,’’ he said.
Fairfax NZ chief executive Sinead Boucher said before the election that it was ‘‘great that Labour recognises the importance of high-quality journalism to a sound democracy’’.
But she questioned its approach of ‘‘piling more money into stateowned media’’ and its plans to turn Radio NZ into a ‘‘super-media platform and broadcaster’’.
Fairfax NZ owns Stuff and newspapers including The
Dominion Post, the Sunday StarTimes and The Press.
Boucher advocated putting any extra funding into a publicly-contestable fund that all independent media companies could access.
Another media industry source questioned the wisdom of ‘‘further fragmenting audiences’’ with the launch of a new free-to-air channel, given the declining levels of profitability in the industry.
Prime minister-designate Jacinda Ardern has yet to confirm who her broadcasting minister will be.
Curran, who has also acted as spokeswoman for the party on broadcasting, communications and information technology issues, has been appointed to the Cabinet.