TVNZ confirms current affairs shows to end

Dozens of journalists will be made redundant after TVNZ confirmed the closure of several of its major current affairs programmes and more are due to face the axe over the coming days.

Broadcasting Minister Melissa Lee said she’s trying to find a solution to “modernise” the media, but wouldn’t be drawn on what policy options were on the table, or whether she had presented a paper to Cabinet as previously flagged.

Yesterday, TVNZ confirmed the end of Fair Go, Tonight and Midday, which will be off air in mid-May, following a period of consultation with staff, which TVNZ chief executive Jodi O’Donnell described as “robust”. Fair Go may return in a different iteration.

That team would have “a specific focus on long-form consumer and current affairs for TVNZ’s digital platforms”. That proposal would create four new roles. The 17 currently on the table, most of which have now been confirmed, leaves 68 job losses.

Meanwhile, the highly speculated fate of Newshub, owned by Warner Bros, is also expected to be revealed at a meeting with staff at 11am today. The company earlier this year proposed shutting down the news division.

Massey University associate professor James Hollings, who teaches in its journalism school in Wellington, said TVNZ cutting its experienced staff was hugely disappointing, and a big loss. It made it all the more urgent for the Government to act on the future of public broadcasting, he said, as advertising spend was not improving.

The Government should consider siphoning off TVNZ as a non-commercial entity as it had done with RNZ, Hollings added. If it could not afford to do that, NZ On Air could be disestablished and its funding instead given to TVNZ, he said.