6 years ago
COMMUNITY BROADCASTING ASSOCIATION OF AUSTRALIA
STEPHEN JONES MP
I acknowledge the traditional owners of this land, I pay my respects to elders past, present and emerging.
I would also like to acknowledge those here from First Nations Media.
Thank you to Jon Bisset, your Chief Executive Officer, for the invitation to speak to you today.
The context for your conference is a time of great challenge for media – across all platforms – not just in Australia but internationally too; We’re living in the era of so called “fake news” – where the authenticity of what would have once been considered facts is challenged.
We also increasingly see the influence of corporate interests in our commercial media and where ‘opinion’ is often substituted for straight reportage.
We’re living in the era of disruption to our traditional media organisations.
The availability of news and information through online media has changed the structures of the industry and is challenging existing business models.
We can also see this disruption in our own changed media consumption habits.
While TV remains the dominant source of news in Australian households, the number of consumers watching free to air commercial TV has fallen 15 per cent since 2008 alone, due partly to the growth of subscription and on-demand services.
Australia already has one of the most concentrated media markets in the world. Already many cities and towns have the majority of their media owned by just one company.
Last year saw the abolition of the “two out of three” rule for media ownership in Australia – one of the last standing protections against media concentration in Australia.
We are yet to see the full implications of this repeal in our media sector, but already changes are underway. We are already seeing big media mergers – such as that between Fairfax and Network Nine which was approved just yesterday by the ACCC.
This merger is likely to put the future of many of Fairfax’s regional newspapers at risk, not to mention the regional jobs affected and the loss of local content.
I can guarantee this won’t be the last media merger we see. One result of these corporate mergers will likely be less local content, as new media conglomerates seek to achieve efficiencies of scale and other cost savings.
Importantly, these changes don’t mean that there is less appetite for local content – in fact I’d suggest the contrary. It just means that increasingly, the big commercial players can’t afford to be in the places that community broadcasters like your organisations are.
Labor’s view is that with the green light now from the Liberals for more media concentration, independent, community broadcasting is more important than ever.
Our democracy thrives when we get our news and information from a diverse range of sources, that is why Labor has committed to restoring some of the cuts to the ABC and SBS.
As well as advocating for community broadcasting, Labor will always fight for public broadcasting too.
The Liberals cut the ABC and SBS after promising no cuts and have launched an ideological attack on public broadcasting with three bills before Parliament to meddle with the ABC and SBS Acts, a competitive neutrality inquiry and a further efficiency review - to say nothing of the barrage of complaints by the Minister and the controversial sacking of the ABC Managing Director.
If you truly value diversity, you don’t seek to silence or intimidate your critics like this.
In this context, there is a lot of good news from the community broadcasting sector.
It is a tribute to your commitment to community broadcasting that in the last ten years, your listenership has close to doubled - community broadcasting now has more than 5.7 million listeners tuning in each week.
Your growth is a tribute to the importance that your audience places on localism. Your reach is broad – you are not only in our cities, but in our country towns and regional cities and remote communities.
You have the largest network in regional areas (41%), rural areas (25%) and in metro areas (34%). Around one in three community radio stations report being the only source of locally produced news in their broadcast area.
Community broadcasting provides an alternative voice in our media landscape, with local voices and local stories, and also makes a significant contribution to media diversity and local content.
Your presence is a particularly significant role for those who don’t easily find a place in our commercial media sector: our Indigenous, print handicapped, ethnic and religious communities.
Community broadcasting is a diverse sector, supported by volunteers and community members, you support more than a thousand full time jobs and around 20,000 volunteers.
You work every day to ensure that community broadcasting is recognised for the important role it plays. You are innovative, sustainable, accessible and trusted.
Community broadcasting is also a proven training ground for those wanting to get a start in broadcasting, build a career in media or those just wanting to be a part of an exciting industry.
All of this means that more and more, community broadcasting is a key pillar in Australian broadcasting, one that often goes unrecognised and unacknowledged. Even more remarkable is that you do all of this on the smallest of budgets. You have fewer resources, less access to advertising revenue and are more reliant on volunteers than your commercial cousins.
As you know, Labor has long been a strong supporter of community broadcasting including introducing digital radio in Australia.
Unfortunately, our political opponents, the Liberals, don’t have such a good track record. As you know, in the 2015 Budget, the Liberals cut $5.6 million from the sector. That put 37 community digital radio services at risk of closure 1 July 2016.
At the last election, Labor promised to restore funding to ensure continued delivery of community digital radio services in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide. This commitment was to assist with digital platform and infrastructure costs including data connectivity, linking, multiplexing and transmission.
It was good news that last year, as part of a deal with One Nation, the Coalition stumped up new funding of $6.1 million over two years for the community radio sector to support digital radio services and one-off spectrum reorganisation costs for analogue radio services. Labor welcomed this change of heart from the Coalition, even if it only came at the behest of the One Nation Political Party.
We can probably thank Senator Hanson’s Chief of Staff for this funding boost – as apparently he got started in his radio career in community radio in Queensland.
We know that additional funding like this is much needed by the community broadcasting sector as you transition to the digital future.
Labor will always offer bi-partisan support investment like this to improve the ongoing sustainability of stations to ensure continued delivery of community radio services to their audiences.
Finally, in closing, I want to thank you for the opportunity to address you today. I wish you all the best with the rest of your conference. I’m sure you will take every advantage of this opportunity to share experiences and learn from each other.
Community broadcasting is an important part of our media landscape. Your diversity is a true reflection of the communities you reach out to every day.
I can assure you that Labor will make sure community broadcasting continues to thrive into the future.
Our democracy depends on it.
ENDS
I would also like to acknowledge those here from First Nations Media.
Thank you to Jon Bisset, your Chief Executive Officer, for the invitation to speak to you today.
The context for your conference is a time of great challenge for media – across all platforms – not just in Australia but internationally too; We’re living in the era of so called “fake news” – where the authenticity of what would have once been considered facts is challenged.
We also increasingly see the influence of corporate interests in our commercial media and where ‘opinion’ is often substituted for straight reportage.
We’re living in the era of disruption to our traditional media organisations.
The availability of news and information through online media has changed the structures of the industry and is challenging existing business models.
We can also see this disruption in our own changed media consumption habits.
While TV remains the dominant source of news in Australian households, the number of consumers watching free to air commercial TV has fallen 15 per cent since 2008 alone, due partly to the growth of subscription and on-demand services.
Australia already has one of the most concentrated media markets in the world. Already many cities and towns have the majority of their media owned by just one company.
Last year saw the abolition of the “two out of three” rule for media ownership in Australia – one of the last standing protections against media concentration in Australia.
We are yet to see the full implications of this repeal in our media sector, but already changes are underway. We are already seeing big media mergers – such as that between Fairfax and Network Nine which was approved just yesterday by the ACCC.
This merger is likely to put the future of many of Fairfax’s regional newspapers at risk, not to mention the regional jobs affected and the loss of local content.
I can guarantee this won’t be the last media merger we see. One result of these corporate mergers will likely be less local content, as new media conglomerates seek to achieve efficiencies of scale and other cost savings.
Importantly, these changes don’t mean that there is less appetite for local content – in fact I’d suggest the contrary. It just means that increasingly, the big commercial players can’t afford to be in the places that community broadcasters like your organisations are.
Labor’s view is that with the green light now from the Liberals for more media concentration, independent, community broadcasting is more important than ever.
Our democracy thrives when we get our news and information from a diverse range of sources, that is why Labor has committed to restoring some of the cuts to the ABC and SBS.
As well as advocating for community broadcasting, Labor will always fight for public broadcasting too.
The Liberals cut the ABC and SBS after promising no cuts and have launched an ideological attack on public broadcasting with three bills before Parliament to meddle with the ABC and SBS Acts, a competitive neutrality inquiry and a further efficiency review - to say nothing of the barrage of complaints by the Minister and the controversial sacking of the ABC Managing Director.
If you truly value diversity, you don’t seek to silence or intimidate your critics like this.
In this context, there is a lot of good news from the community broadcasting sector.
It is a tribute to your commitment to community broadcasting that in the last ten years, your listenership has close to doubled - community broadcasting now has more than 5.7 million listeners tuning in each week.
Your growth is a tribute to the importance that your audience places on localism. Your reach is broad – you are not only in our cities, but in our country towns and regional cities and remote communities.
You have the largest network in regional areas (41%), rural areas (25%) and in metro areas (34%). Around one in three community radio stations report being the only source of locally produced news in their broadcast area.
Community broadcasting provides an alternative voice in our media landscape, with local voices and local stories, and also makes a significant contribution to media diversity and local content.
Your presence is a particularly significant role for those who don’t easily find a place in our commercial media sector: our Indigenous, print handicapped, ethnic and religious communities.
Community broadcasting is a diverse sector, supported by volunteers and community members, you support more than a thousand full time jobs and around 20,000 volunteers.
You work every day to ensure that community broadcasting is recognised for the important role it plays. You are innovative, sustainable, accessible and trusted.
Community broadcasting is also a proven training ground for those wanting to get a start in broadcasting, build a career in media or those just wanting to be a part of an exciting industry.
All of this means that more and more, community broadcasting is a key pillar in Australian broadcasting, one that often goes unrecognised and unacknowledged. Even more remarkable is that you do all of this on the smallest of budgets. You have fewer resources, less access to advertising revenue and are more reliant on volunteers than your commercial cousins.
As you know, Labor has long been a strong supporter of community broadcasting including introducing digital radio in Australia.
Unfortunately, our political opponents, the Liberals, don’t have such a good track record. As you know, in the 2015 Budget, the Liberals cut $5.6 million from the sector. That put 37 community digital radio services at risk of closure 1 July 2016.
At the last election, Labor promised to restore funding to ensure continued delivery of community digital radio services in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide. This commitment was to assist with digital platform and infrastructure costs including data connectivity, linking, multiplexing and transmission.
It was good news that last year, as part of a deal with One Nation, the Coalition stumped up new funding of $6.1 million over two years for the community radio sector to support digital radio services and one-off spectrum reorganisation costs for analogue radio services. Labor welcomed this change of heart from the Coalition, even if it only came at the behest of the One Nation Political Party.
We can probably thank Senator Hanson’s Chief of Staff for this funding boost – as apparently he got started in his radio career in community radio in Queensland.
We know that additional funding like this is much needed by the community broadcasting sector as you transition to the digital future.
Labor will always offer bi-partisan support investment like this to improve the ongoing sustainability of stations to ensure continued delivery of community radio services to their audiences.
Finally, in closing, I want to thank you for the opportunity to address you today. I wish you all the best with the rest of your conference. I’m sure you will take every advantage of this opportunity to share experiences and learn from each other.
Community broadcasting is an important part of our media landscape. Your diversity is a true reflection of the communities you reach out to every day.
I can assure you that Labor will make sure community broadcasting continues to thrive into the future.
Our democracy depends on it.
ENDS