The announced closure of Television New Zealand’s last primetime current affairs programme seems to be the final nail in the coffin for New Zealand’s television credibility. Coming a day after the announcement of the closure of Newshub, it shows that Kiwis have the worst television and video media in the Western world.

Let’s compare ourselves with our mates across the ditch. Australia’s ABC TV features a nightly current affairs show called 7.30. The blurb for it reads:

“Sarah Ferguson presents Australia’s premier daily current affairs program, delivering agenda-setting public affairs journalism and interviews that hold the powerful to account. Plus political analysis from Laura Tingle.”

Clearly 7.30 is far more serious than our Seven Sharp with its fluffy stories and advertorials. The ABC also screens six weekly current affairs shows and documentaries this week. Shows like Australian Story, Four Corners and Media Watch.

But Australia has five times as many people as we do so that’s why they can afford it, right?

Ireland has five million people, like NZ, but they still have primetime current affairs. In fact, the Irish enjoy quite a lot of it. The Irish version of TVNZ is RTÉ and features a nightly current affairs show called Nationwide and three weekly current affairs programmes on serious topics.

There are several other human interest factual programmes too, on subjects like history, gardening, dance and more. It’s the same in other countries with similar populations such as Norway, Denmark, Finland and so on.

It’s true that in New Zealand, there’s still the off-peak studio politics programmes like Q+A, and current affairs in te ao Māori are well examined on Whakaata Māori. But what about the rest of NZ?

Some people might say television is dead, and everything is online now. But nearly all online current affairs videos start out as television programmes. The only exceptions are Newsroom’s video investigations with Melanie Reid, and Stuff Circuit which is now disbanded. And for younger audiences there is Re: which TVNZ is also making cuts to.

Death of current affairs TV
The death of New Zealand’s prime-time current affairs television has been a long time coming. At first it was documentaries that dwindled and then disappeared off our screens.

Other genres that are expensive to produce have also become extinct or rarer than a fairy tern — drama, science programmes, kidult, arts programmes, wildlife documentaries, chat shows. Now we can add consumer affairs and prime-time current affairs to the list.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. If other countries can do it, why not NZ?

On Wednesday, the Minister for Media and Communications, Melissa Lee, said “I don’t think I can actually save anything. I’m trying to be who I am, the Minister for Media and Communications.”

This suggests either a lack of understanding of her role or a lack of ambition. She also let slip that there was no way she could save Newshub.

The only substantive solution to come from the minister is her promise to review the Broadcasting Act. But that review process was initiated by the Ministry for Culture and Heritage years ago and started under the Labour government.

Moreover, the Broadcasting Act does little more than lay out the rules for broadcasting complaints, election broadcasting, and establish NZ On Air, the BSA and Te Māngai Pāho.

Minister just tweaking
The minister says she is reviewing the Broadcasting Act to create a “more level playing field” and allow media businesses to “innovate”. That doesn’t sound like it will do much for television and video current affairs, which will take much more than just tweaking how NZ On Air and the BSA work.

Perhaps she intends something much more comprehensive, such as a new funding stream for public media, perhaps through a levy, a compulsory subscription, or even a licence fee.

Despite her protestations, there are several options available to the minister. To save TVNZ’s Fair Go and Sunday, she could provide TVNZ with an interim cash injection (which is actually what governments often do in disasters) until the comprehensive long-term funding is sorted out.

To save Newshub she could promise to remove advertising from TVNZ, or partially on weekends only. This would throw Warner Bros Discovery a lifeline in the form of advertisers looking for a television station to advertise on. She does not have to stand by and watch while our media burns.

Sunday is only with us for a few more weeks. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Myles Thomas is a trustee for Better Public Media Trust. This article was first published by The New Zealand Herald and is republished with the author’s permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Warner Bros Discovery has done a deal with Stuff to provide news to replace Newshub. It will keep news on TV channel Three from July 6 and help Three retain some viewers.

It also means important income for Stuff, but it will also stretch the company’s staff, finances and technology.

Stuff will provide a one-hour bulletin each weekday and a half-hour on weekends.

Stuff will also retain a live Newshub website.

Warner Bros Discovery chief executive and Stuff publisher Sinead Boucher confirmed the arrangement at a joint news conference today.

Boucher had told her staff the company will “definitely be bringing some Newshub staff” to produce the 6pm bulletins.

She then told reporters she was unsure how many staff would be required, but it would be fewer than “40 to 50” specified in a “stripped back” proposal from Newshub’s own staff.

‘We are digital first’
“We’re not getting into the TV business. We are a digital first multimedia company building a new 6pm product for Warner Brothers,” she said.

Mediawatch understands many media companies approached WBD with proposals to provide news after the company first proposed the cost-saving closure in late February.

However, by the time of the confirmation earlier this month most of those had been rejected by WBD.

Sky TV was also reported to be in the running. It currently runs a Newshub-produced bulletin at 5:30pm each weekday on the free-to-air channel Sky Open and would require a replacement. It also had plenty of TV production facilities.

Sinead Boucher said a Sky bulletin was not included in the deal, but she hoped there would be discussions about that.

Negotiations were carried out in secret both before and after Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) confirmed the complete closure of Newshub on July 5, leaving the company with no news presence.

Stuff refused to comment during the process and Stuff journalists told RNZ Mediawatch on Monday night they were unaware of an impending announcement.

“We didn’t want to raise expectations for Newshub staff when we weren’t sure what would be required,” Boucher told reporters today, explaining that the deal had been done in haste.

Why do the deal – and what’s it worth?
The money WBD is putting into the deal is confidential but it is certain to be just a fraction of the current cost of running Newshub, which would run to tens of millions of dollars a year.

WBD was clearly determined to carve that cost off the bottom line of its loss-making local operation. The financial benefit for Stuff may not be great taking the set-up and running costs into account.

WBD’s Glen Kyne said neither company would comment on specific commercial details, but when asked about the possible profit margin for Stuff, Boucher said: “Both parties are satisfied with where we have ended up.”

But while the audience for TV news bulletins is declining — and the ad revenue has fallen accordingly — it is still substantial for TVNZ 1 and Three. The “appointment viewing” time of 6pm creates a viewing peak which the TV broadcasters use to hold viewers for the entertainment or factual programmes that follow.

Former Newshub chief Hal Crawford told Mediawatch the overall audience for Three could collapse without news in the evening.

“There’s still a reason that the 1 and the 3 on remotes around the country are worn down. News is the one programme that runs 365 days a year . . .  which the schedule is going to rely on to lead into prime time. So the rest of your schedule is going to dwindle. Ratings are gonna fall off and everything is going to go to pieces,” Crawford told Mediawatch.

“The loss of the newsroom represents the loss of the ability to respond to any event in real time. That is the heart and soul of a traditional TV broadcaster.”

Why Stuff?
Stuff has journalists in more places around the country than any other news publisher.

Stuff’s publisher Sinead Boucher recently told a parliamentary committee it had journalists in 19 locations, even after years of cuts and successive retrenchments.

“We have replatformed our business and have new ways of working. We look at this as starting this bulletin afresh rather than using the broadcast-heavy technology of today,” she told reporters at today’s news conference.

It also has audio and video production facilities at some sites and some senior journalists with TV reporting and presenting experience, such as former Newshub political editor Tova O’Brien, former TV3 current affairs reporter Paula Penfold and senior journalist Andrea Vance.

But Stuff video ventures have not endured. It launched its own free online video platform Play Stuff in mid-2019. It also hired key former TV3 current affairs staff for its own longform video productions but disbanded the Stuff Circuit team earlier this year.

When the Stuff app and website were refreshed recently, short vertical videos were added as a feature, called Stuff Shorts.

Stuff’s weakness has in the past been a dependence on newspaper advertising. It was only last year that Stuff launched its first paywalls for online news for three of its mastheads.

Stuff’s main rival NZME has half the country’s radio networks in addition to newsrooms supplying its newspapers and websites. NZME’s New Zealand Herald has been getting revenue from “premium content” digital subscriptions for four years.

After Boucher acquired Stuff in 2020, Stuff embarked on a digital transition creating more digital audio and video content. It has hired executives from multimedia companies such as Nadia Tolich (ex-NZME now Stuff Digital managing director) and former NZME digital leader Laura Maxwell, now Stuff’s chief executive.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Many observers said this had been coming but few seemed to have a plan for it, including the government. 

Mediawatch looks at what viewers will lose, efforts to resist the cuts and talks to the news chief at Newshub which is set to close completely.

By Colin Peacock, RNZ Mediawatch presenter

On the AM show last Wednesday, newsreader Nicky Styris suffered a frog in the throat at the wrong time.

Host Melissa Chan Green took over her bulletin while Styris quickly recovered. Minutes later Styris had to take the place of no-show panel guest Paula Bennett.

Just before that, viewers saw co-host Lloyd Burr on his knees fixing the studio flat-pack furniture with a drill.

Three hours later they were at an all-staff meeting at which executives from offshore owner Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) confirmed the complete closure of Newshub by midyear.

On TVNZ’s Midday news soon after, reporter Kim Baker-Wilson was live from the scene of the announcement of Newshub’s demise.

The previous day the roles were reversed, with Newshub’s Simon Shepherd outside TVNZ’s building reporting TVNZ’s Midday had been scrapped, along with the late news Tonight and Fair Go. 

On Wednesday TVNZ also confirmed flagship current affairs show Sunday will cease next month.

So as things stand, it’s the end of the line for all news bulletins on TVNZ other than 1 News at 6, though the news-like shows Breakfast and Seven Sharp survive because they accommodate lucrative sponsored content (“activations” in the ad business) as well as ads.

And TV channel Three will be entirely news-free for the first time in its 35-year history.

Senior journalists led by investigations editor Michael Morrah presented a proposal for a stripped-back and shortened news bulletin to keep the Newshub name alive (and some jobs) but while WBD took it seriously, it eventually turned the idea down.

Another media player to fill the Newshub void?
There have been rumours and reports that other media companies were talking to WBD about filling the Newshub at 6 news void.

Initially light-on-detail reports of lifelines suggested a possible sale of Newshub to another media company. Then there were reports of other media companies pitching to make news for WBD on a much-reduced budget.

Among the names mentioned in media despatches was NZME, which has radio and video studios and journalists around the country, though most of them are north of Taupo.

NZME told Stuff “it was not currently part of the process”.

The Herald’s Media Insider column reported on Tuesday that Newshub was “set to receive a lifeline” and understood Stuff was “among the leading contenders.”

However when Stuff itself reported on Wednesday that Stuff was “understood to be a likely contender,” a spokesperson for Stuff declined to comment to Stuff’s reporter on whether Stuff had been in talks with WBD — or not.

RNZ said it wasn’t in the frame for this. (It recently killed off the video version of its only daily news show with pictures, Checkpoint).

Sky TV has production facilities galore and its free-to-air TV channel Sky Open currently runs a Newshub-made news bulletin at 5:30 each weekday. Sky has only said it was an “interesting idea” — or words to that effect.

“At this point there is no deal,” WBD local boss Glen Kyne told reporters after confirming the closure of Newshub on Wednesday.

Kyne also said the company’s “door has been open to all internal and external feedback and ideas, and we will continue to be”.

But anyone opening that door clearly isn’t willing to do it in daylight — or  tell the rest of the media about it.

Lifelines likely?

If there is to be any kind of “Newshub-lite” lifeline, a key question is: what is WBD prepared to pay for the programme?

Presumably not much, given that they said they had no choice but to carve the cost of Newshub — amounting to tens of millions a year — from its bottom line in line with its reducing revenue.

So is it worth any major media company’s while to commit to making news in video for another outlet? And it would have to be done in a hurry because the last Newshub bulletins screen on July 5.

When Newshub’s owners first announced they wanted to get rid of it in late February, its former chief editor Hal Crawford told Mediawatch the problem with finding a buyer was that minimum viable cost for a credible TV news operation was greater than anyone here was prepared to spend.

Longtime TV3 news boss Mark Jennings (now co-editor of Newsroom) said any substitute service on the fraction of the current budget would have another problem — TVNZ’s 1 News.

“You’re up against a sophisticated TVNZ product so viewers will have an immediate comparison. Probably that won’t be favorable for Warner Brothers,” he told RNZ.

TVNZ has its own news production problems after the cuts they confirmed this week.

“We’re proposing to establish a new long-form team within our news operation, which would continue to bring important current affairs and consumer affairs stories to Aotearoa in a different way on our digital platforms.”

TVNZ declined Mediawatch‘s request to speak to TVNZ’s news chief Phil O’Sullivan about that at this time.

Newshub’s news boss responds

One who did though is Newshub news boss Richard Sutherland — appointed as interim senior director of news at Newshub in January.

It was his second spell at Newshub, during a career in broadcast news spanning four decades at almost every significant national news outlet in the country, including RNZ, where he stepped down as head of news a year ago.

In that time he’s experienced many a financial crisis in the business — but did he see this one coming?

“The last couple of weeks has been coming for quite some time. I think that the so-called legacy news operations have almost done too good a job of keeping the lights on and papering over the cracks. And we just got to a point [the industry] couldn’t paper over the cracks any longer.

“But when you look at audience behaviour and the fall off and revenue, particularly in the advertising market, then that doesn’t surprise me that we’ve got to where we’ve got to.”

But if the audience was big, the ad revenue would be too?

“It’s certainly by no means as big as it once was simply because people have other options available to them. The cliche is that you’re not in a war with the other media, but in a war for people’s attention.”

“It’s not so much the audience has changed so much as the dynamics of the advertising market that has really changed over the last sort of 10 to 15 years. The digital advertising — and the big two main players in that space, Facebook and Google — are eating everybody’s lunch.”

TV ad income on the slide
Annual advertising stats that came out this very week show media in 2023 attracted $3.36 billion across the whole of the media industry — about the same as in 2022.

But TV advertising revenue of $517 million in 2022 slumped to $443 million last year.

“That’s why what the TV industry has found is that can’t cut its costs fast enough to meet the falloff in the advertising income,” Sutherland told Mediawatch. 

Digital-only ad revenue rose by $88 million in 2023 — but it’s Google and Facebook which secures the vast bulk of that.

But if this has been coming for a number of years, as Sutherland says, has there been enough planning for it?

After the closure of Newshub was mooted by its owner last month, seven of Sutherland’s colleagues led by investigations editor Michael Morrah put together a transition plan to keep Newshub on air in a few days.

Shouldn’t this sort of transition planning have been done at high levels over recent years right across the television business?

“Every media company that I’ve worked for or have observed over the last few years has been trying to innovate and get to a more sustainable level. The revenue was just collapsing far faster than anyone ever anticipated.”

“It annoys me when I hear people say older media haven’t innovated enough. We’ve done a lot of innovation. That’s pretty lazy politics to just say: ‘You need to innovate.’

“It’s also lazy politics to say, the government should just come in and bail everyone out. New Zealand Incorporated needs to have a big conversation about what it wants to do with the media and how it wants to fund it.

“For the past few years the industry has been like so many rats in a sack, fighting with each chasing a smaller and smaller amount of ad dollars. We need to get together and work out how we get ourselves collectively out of the sack,” Sutherland told Mediawatch.

Shortly before TVNZ and Newshub announced their cuts, there was a meeting of chief executives including Newshub’s owners Warner Bros Discovery to discuss a shared new service. TVNZ rejected the idea.

“But a lot has changed in the last couple of months. And I would like to think that eventually we’ll get to a point where we can actually have honest and productive conversations about what we can do to help each other as well as maintaining a degree of competition, but also realising that if we just keep fighting with each other, we’re not going to have a sustainable industry,” Sutherland said.

Would Sutherland want to work for a low-budget alternative to Newshub stave off the complete closure? And would Kiwis want such a service?

“There is a segment of the audience that appreciates a very highly produced, well-curated news bulletin every night. And there’s large numbers of people who no longer see that as part of their media diet.

“The trick is to provide options so that people can get what they want when they want it.

“It’s not really for me to say what a possible replacement for Newsub might look like. I’m well away from those negotiations.

“If we reach a stage where the media scene here withers away to nothing, there’ll be no-one to tell the stories. The media uncovers a lot of shady stuff in this country.

“And the fear of media coverage prevents people in positions of power and authority at all levels doing a lot of shady stuff. So it is important to document the ructions of the New Zealand media scene just like we do in other parts of the country.”

Minister in a corner

The day the axe fell at Newshub and at TVNZ, New Zealand’s screen producers’ guild Spada said “while the newsroom cuts have dominated media coverage to date, it is actually the whole production sector being impacted”.

“While TVNZ and Three aren’t giving definitive numbers at this time, Spada has calculated that we are looking at around $50 million coming out of our sector,” said president Irene Gardiner.

Spada is also asking the government to exempt screen funding agencies from the percent public spending cuts and to force the international streaming platform to support local production.

Spada called for” swift and decisive action” from the government on this.

Should they be holding their breath?

When confronted by reporters for a response to the current TV news crisis, Broadcasting Minister Melissa Lee said: “If only I was a magician, if I could actually just snap up a solution, that would be fantastic.

“But I’m not a magician, and I’m trying to find a solution to modernise the industry . . .  there is a process happening.”

But the media are not expecting magic — just a plan rather than assertions of a process with no timeline.

She has repeatedly said she’s preparing policy in a paper to take to cabinet, but refused to give any details.

On RNZ’s Checkpoint, persistent and pointed questions from Lisa Owen yielded few further clues.

Newstalk ZB Drive host Heather du Plessis-Allan told Melissa Lee she was being “weird and shady” and the next morning ZB’s Mike Hosking told her she was using “buzzwords that don’t mean anything” and was doomed to fail.

Stuff’s Tova O’Brien reported that the need to consult coalition allies on policy means it can’t be progressed until after Winston Peters returns from overseas at the end of the month.

The under-wraps media policy is also not in the government’s recently-released quarterly action plan.

Meanwhile this week, our two biggest TV news broadcasters ran out of time.

Ex-minister leading resistance to cuts

After his unenlightening on-air interview with minister Melissa Lee on Thursday morning, Mike Hosking’s ZB listeners told him she reminded them of ministers in the last government.

Coincidentally, one of them was also one of few people who did speak out about the crisis while it was unfolding.

Michael Wood represented TVNZ journalists from the E tū union as its negotiations specialist.

E tū  is now taking legal action against TVNZ, claiming it failed to abide by the conditions of their employment agreement.

Could that reverse or wind back any of the cuts TVNZ has announced?

“That does remain to be seen. The collective agreement has very clear processes around what should happen if TVNZ wants to move forward and make changes. It requires [staff members] to be involved throughout the process, and for the company to try and reach agreement with them. Our very strong view is that that hasn’t happened.”

“Staff have said: ‘Look, five years ago, we came to you and said we want to do these things with our shows to make sure they have a sustainable future to make sure that they have a strong online platform.’ And [TVNZ] frankly has not demonstrated strategy and leadership around those things.”

“These are still shows that are very, very popular. Canceling them will reduce costs, but based on TVNZ’s own information that they’ve provided, it will reduce revenue by more.”

It’s been difficult to get any media company executives or even journalists at the two companies affected by these cuts to talk about them, even off-the-record.

Wood is one of the few people who has spoken frankly to broadcasters’ executives, albeit confidentially behind closed doors.

“There is a bit of a delicate dance which has to happen when media companies themselves are making these decisions. And media need to report on that.

“So I have some sympathy, but these aren’t just individual employment issues. This is a public policy issue . . .  about whether we have a functioning and vibrant Fourth Estate.”

Wood was until last year a minister in the Labour government which could have averted the TVNZ cuts.

It spent more than $16 million planning a new public media entity to replace TVNZ and RNZ with a not-for-profit public media entity — but then scrapped it weeks before it was due to begin.

“You’ve just identified one of the core things that we’ve got to deal with. TVNZ, in terms of its statutory form, is neither one thing nor the other. It has a commercial imperative and it also has some other obligations in terms of public good.

“News and current affairs should be at the heart of that — and that is something that we should be much clearer about.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The day the news axe fell: Presenters, insiders fear ‘huge blow for democracy’

The future of New Zealand’s media landscape is becoming clearer by the day, with confirmation that it will no longer feature one of the country’s big two TV news networks.

Warner Bros. Discovery has revealed that all of Newshub’s operations will be shut down, effective July 5. That includes the flagship 6pm bulletin, The AM Show, and the Newshub website.

294 staff are set to lose their jobs.

It’s also been confirmed that TVNZ’s programme Sunday will be cancelled, following yesterday’s announcement that Fair Go, as well as both 1News at Midday and 1News Tonight, are being canned in their current format.

New Zealand’s media industry has been rocked by the bleeding obvious which is that their failed ratings system for legacy media was always more art than science.

The NZ radio ratings system is a diary that you fill in every 15 minutes — which no one ever fills in properly.

The NZ newspaper ratings are opinion polls and the NZ TV ratings system is a magical 180 boxes that limits choice to whoever had the TV remote.

When the sales rep told the advertiser that 300,000 people would read, see, hear their advert, it was based on ratings systems that were flattering but not real.

With the ruthlessness of online audience measurement, advertisers could see exactly how many people were actually seeing their adverts, and the legacy media never adapted to this new reality.

What we see now is hollowed out journalism competing against social media hate algorithms designed to generate emotional responses rather than Fourth Estate accountability.

New Zealand has NEVER had the audience size to make advertising based broadcasting feasible, that’s why it’s always required a state broadcaster — with no Fourth Estate who will hold this hard right racist climate denying beneficiary bashing government to account?

Minister missing in action
Broadcasting Minister Melissa Lee has refused to support the Fair Digital News Bargaining Bill that Labour’s former minister Willie Jackson put forward that would at least force Google and Facebook to pay for the journalism they take for free.

Lee has been utterly hopeless and missing in action here — if “Democracy dies in darkness”, National are pulling the plug.

This government doesn’t want accountability, does it?

Instagram this year switched on a new filter to smother political debate and we know actual journalism has been smothered by the social media algorithms.

I don’t think that most people who get their information from their social media feeds understand they aren’t seeing the most important journalism but are in fact seeing the most inflammatory rhetoric to keep people outraged and addicted to doom scrolling.

When Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters does his big lie that the entire mainstream media were bribed because of a funding note by NZ on Air in regards to coverage of Māori issues for the Public Interest Journalism fund — which by the way was quickly clarified by NZ on Air as not an editorial demand — he conflates and maliciously spins and NZ’s democracy suffers.

Muddled TVNZ
Television New Zealand has always come across like a muddle. It aspires to be BBC public broadcasting yet has the commercial imperatives of any Crown Owned Enterprise. If Labour had merged TVNZ and RNZ and made TVNZ 1 commercial free so that the advertising revenue could cross over to Newshub, it would have rebuilt the importance of public broadcasting while actually regulating the broken free market.

When will we get a Labour Party that actually gives a damn about public broadcasting rather than pay lip service to it?

Ultimately Newshub’s demise is a story of ruthless transnational interests and geopolitical cultural hegemony.

Corporate Hollywood soft power wants to continue its cultural dominance as the South Pacific friction continues between the United States and China.

New Zealand is an important plank for American hegemony in the South Pacific and as China and American competition heats up, Warners Bros Discovery suddenly buying a large stake in our media was always a geopolitical calculation over a commercial one.

Cultural dominance doesn’t require nor want an active journalism, so they will keep the channel open purely as a means of dominating domestic culture without any of the Fourth Estate obligations.

That bitter angry feeling you have watching Warner Bros Discovery destroy our Fourth Estate is righteous.

Social licence trashed
They bought a media outlet that has had a 35-year history of being a structural part of our media environment and dumping it trashes their social licence in this country.

That feeling of rage you have watching a multibillion transnational vandalise our environment is going to be repeated the millisecond you see the American mining interests lining up to mine conservation land with all their promises to repair anything they break.

Remember — the transnational ain’t your friend regardless of its pronouns.

That person they rolled in with the soft-glazed CEO face to do the sad, sad crying is disingenuous and condescending.

Now Warner Bros has killed Newshub off, we have no option as Kiwis but to boycott whatever is left of TV3 and water down Warner Bros remaining interests altogether.

They’ve burnt their bridges with us in New Zealand by walking away from their social contract, we should have no troubles returning the favour!

The only winners here are rightwing politicians who don’t want their counterproductive and corrupt decisions to be scrutinised.

We are a poorer and weaker democracy after these news cuts.

Why bother having a Minister of Broadcasting if all they do is fiddle while the industry burns?

Welcome to your new media future in Aotearoa New Zealand . . .

Republished with permission from The Daily Blog.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The company says no deal is in place yet with any third party to supply daily news.

Newshub staff learned of the company’s decision at a meeting fronted by Warner Bros Discovery’s Australia and New Zealand chief Glenn Kyne and its Asia-Pacific president James Gibbons today.

In a statement, Gibbons said there was “nothing anyone in our New Zealand networks business could have done better” to avoid the closure.

“It was a combination of very strong economic headwinds both in New Zealand and the global market,” he said.

“The downturn has been severe, and the bounce-back has not materialised as expected.”

Warner Bros Discovery first revealed its proposal to close Newshub on February 28. Newshub Michael Morrah told RNZ’s Midday Report many staff saw today’s decision as inevitable.

‘Many resigned themselves’
“The confirmation was still very upsetting and disappointing, but nothing like the shock of six weeks ago. Many had resigned themselves to the closure,” he said.

“I have worked here for 18 years. We believe in what we do. And know it is important to the people who watch — 900,000 every week. What happens to those people who relied on us to present key news and current affairs?

“And to the investigations that are being worked on?”

Gibbons said $74 million disappeared from broadcast TV advertising in New Zealand in 2023 alone. That was the single largest year-on-year drop over the last three decades outside of the Global Financial Crisis in 2007-8.

“Every business in its own market has to be financially sustainable, and we simply could not continue in our current form.”

Fresh annual figures released yesterday showed total TV advertising revenue in New Zealand TV fell from $517 million in 2022 to $443 million last year.  Digital advertising revenue is increasing but the vast bulk of that goes to offshore tech companies Google and Facebook.

Kyne said free-to-air and news operations were too expensive to run as they were. He was concerned that the move would leave TVNZ as the only service running free-to-air broadcast news, but said there was no other choice.

Impact on plurality
“We are deeply aware of the effect this is likely to have on the plurality of media voices in New Zealand. Having just one TV news operation in New Zealand — that is state-owned — will be an ongoing issue until it is solved.

“But as we noted on the day, it is simply impossible to continue operating in our current form.”

The final day for staff who have been made redundant will be on July 5, and that will also be the final day for the Newshub bulletin, the statement said.

When Newshub’s closure was first proposed in late February, staff were given six weeks to give feedback on the proposal.

“Myself and six colleagues suggested a stripped back Newshub live at 6 and retention of the Newshub (website) to transition from linear TV to a fully-digital model. We thought we had a profitable way forward.

‘We were told the option would be problematic for WBD and produce a downward trajectory for the business,“ Newshub’s investigations editor Michael Morrah told RNZ’s Midday Report.

Other alternative proposals to replace or continue Newshub were also considered amid heavy secrecy, bolstered by the use of non-disclosure agreements.

Considering proposals
In recent days media reports have indicated WBD has been considering proposals from other media companies to create a news service for the company’s channels.

New Zealand Herald media commentator Shayne Currie yesterday reported that Stuff was a leading contender for taking on the organisation’s 6pm news. Some have speculated that NZME, which owns the Herald and Newstalk ZB, could also have an interest.

WBD said today no arrangement with any third party was in place but Mediawatch understands the company has already rebuffed several and is only pursuing projects with one or two players.

Stuff reported yesterday that Stuff was “understood to be a likely contender”  but a spokesperson for Stuff declined to comment on whether it had been in talks with Warner Bros Discovery.

“The main thing is Newshub needs a lifeline. These people deserve a lifeline. Those people who are looking to do these deals, get on and get them done and save some of these people and save some news for Kiwis,” Newshub presenter Patrick Gower told reporters after today’s announcement.

Kyne said the company’s “door has been open to listening to all internal and external feedback and ideas, and we will continue to do so”.

“However, as of now, no deal regarding news output has been made.”

News archives
Kyne said the company was also looking to work with Nga Taonga to preserve its 30-year news archives.

Mediawatch understands that several staff made submissions calling on the company to preserve those archives, with fears that years of work — and New Zealand history — could be lost if they were deleted.

Newshub’s shutdown is the biggest and most far-reaching news closure in the post-covid era.

“Every time we think we’ve landed on stable footing, something comes along and makes it unstable again, forcing us to look at ways of further reducing costs,” Kyne said in a statement when the closure was first proposed.

“We’ve now reached a stage where any further reduction in costs means . . .  proposing to shut down the newsroom and the Newshub website.”

“Everyone can see that the media sector, here in New Zealand, and around the world is facing some very tough circumstances. While Warner Bros Discovery is a large global media company, each business is managed on its ability to sustain itself within the market it operates in.

“Subsidising losses for ongoing years indefinitely is not sustainable,” said Gibbons.

At the time, Warner Bros Discovery said its proposal was is to make the ThreeNow online app “the core of the model, supported by free-to-air linear channels” such as Three, Bravo, Eden, Rush and HGTV.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

All of Newshub operations — part of New Zealand’s second largest television news network channel Three — are to be shut down and 250 people will lose their jobs. The shutdown includes the company’s website, Warner Bros Discovery announced today.

The last 6pm news bulletin will air on July 5.

Warner Bros Discovery said talks were ongoing with third parties to provide a pared-back news service — such as a 6pm bulletin for the Three channel. However, no deals have been reached yet.

Head of networks Glen Kyne said Warner Bros Discovery had been clear it would listen to all feedback both internal and external over the five-week consultation period.

“Our door has been open and some conversations have taken place. They’re continuing to take place in confidence but there is no deal,” he said.

He promised to let staff know immediately if any new deals could be finalised.

He thanked staff for their feedback.

Definite shutdown
The announcement of the definite shutdown came at an all-staff meeting at a hall close to Newshub’s office in Auckland’s Eden Terrace this morning.

Newshub staff were told by Warner Bros Discovery managers in February it planned to axe the entire news operation.

The newsroom was losing too much money, staff were told.

Here is all the full information – devastated for my pals, colleagues and everyone who gives 110% there, NZ is a worse off place today with this news. https://t.co/q8HurxwV5g

— Darren Bevan (@geekboy73) April 9, 2024

Since then, it is understood there have been talks between Warner Bros Discovery and a number of media firms, including Stuff, about ways that part of the business could be preserved. It has been suggested that could include the production of a “slimmed-down” news bulletin by a third party.

Meanwhile, TVNZ staff will today hear the fate of its Sunday current affairs show, after the company confirmed on Tuesday it was axing the on-air version of Fair Go, and the Midday and Tonight news programmes.

Independent Spinoff founder Duncan Greive said the changes would be irreversible, and a “tragic” outcome for those affected.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz