Sky TV has agreed to fully acquire TV3 owner Discovery New Zealand for $1.

Discovery NZ is a part of US media giant Warner Bros Discovery, and operates channel Three and online streaming platform ThreeNow.

NZX-listed Sky said the deal would be completed on a cash-free, debt-free basis, with completion expected on August 1.

Sky expected the deal to deliver revenue diversification and uplift of around $95 million a year.

Sky expected Discovery NZ’s operations to deliver sustainable underlying earnings growth of at least $10 million from the 2028 financial year.

Sky chief executive Sophie Moloney said it was a compelling opportunity for the company, with net integration costs of about $6.5 million.

“This is a compelling opportunity for Sky that directly supports our ambition to be Aotearoa New Zealand’s most engaging and essential media company,” she said.

Confidential advance notice
Sky said it gave the Commerce Commission confidential advance notice of the transaction, and the commission did not intend to consider the acquisition further.

Warner Bros Discovery Australia and NZ managing director Michael Brooks said it was a “fantastic outcome” for both companies.

“The continued challenges faced by the New Zealand media industry are well documented, and over the past 12 months, the Discovery NZ team has worked to deliver a new, more sustainable business model following a significant restructure in 2024,” Brooks said.

“While this business is not commercially viable as a standalone asset in WBD’s New Zealand portfolio, we see the value Three and ThreeNow can bring to Sky’s existing offering of complementary assets.”

Sky said on completion, Discovery NZ’s balance sheet would be clear of some long-term obligations, including property leases and content commitments, and would include assets such as the ThreeNow platform.

Sky said irrespective of the transaction, the company was confident of achieving its 30 cents a share dividend target for 2026.

‘Massive change’ for NZ media – ThreeNews to continue
Founder of The Spinoff and media commentator Duncan Greive said the deal would give Sky more reach and was a “massive change” in New Zealand’s media landscape.

He noted Sky’s existing free-to-air presence via Sky Open (formerly Prime), but said acquiring Three gave it the second-most popular audience outlet on TV.

“Because of the inertia of how people use television, Three is just a much more accessible channel and one that’s been around longer,” Greive said.

“To have basically the second-most popular channel in the country as part of their stable just means they’ve got a lot more ad inventory, much bigger audiences.”

It also gave Sky another outlet for their content, and would allow it to compete further against TVNZ, both linear and online, Greive said.

He said there may be a question mark around the long-term future of Three’s news service, which was produced by Stuff.

No reference to ThreeNews
Sky made no reference to ThreeNews in its announcement. However, Stuff confirmed ThreeNews would continue for now.

“Stuff’s delivery of ThreeNews is part of the deal but there are also now lots of new opportunities ahead that we are excited to explore together,” Stuff owner Sinead Boucher said in a statement.

On the deal itself, Boucher said she was “delighted” to see Three back in New Zealand ownership under Sky.

“And who doesn’t love a $1 deal!” Boucher said, referring to her own $1 deal to buy Stuff from Australia’s Nine Entertainment in 2020.

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

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Melissa Lee has been ousted from New Zealand’s coalition cabinet and stripped of the Media portfolio, and Penny Simmonds has lost the Disability Issues portfolio in a reshuffle.

Climate Change and Revenue Minister Simon Watts will take Lee’s spot in cabinet.

Simmonds was a minister outside of cabinet.

The changes came today five months to the day after Luxon first announced the ministerial roles and responsibilities.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon announced the changes in a statement this afternoon.

He said Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith — currently overseas — would take over the Media and Broadcasting role, while Social Development Minister Louise Upston would pick up Disability Issues.

Lee was under pressure after Warner Bros Discovery announced it would stop producing local news through Newshub, and shut the majority of its operations in New Zealand.

Repeated questions
She faced repeated questions about what the government would do about the closure of Newshub, with Labour saying she had “more than enough time” to find solutions.

Media Minister Melissa Lee demoted.       Video: RNZ

Simmonds had also been in headlines over the handling of changes to disability-related funding.

She admitted the handling of the disability funding changes — which included restricting the way equipment and support services were funded — was bungled, and later apologised for it.

She signed off on the decision a few days before it was announced on the ministry’s social media accounts, taking disabled people and carers by surprise.

Labour said the changes were callous and a broken promise, and leader Chris Hipkins called for her to be sacked over it.

After the changes, Finance Minister Nicola Willis said future decisions on the funding would have to be taken to cabinet.

‘Changing circumstances’
Speaking to reporters, Luxon said the changes were about making sure the government had “the right people on the right assignment at the right time”.

“In both these cases of both these portfolios there have been significant changes and complexities added to them over the course since the ministers were allocated these responsibilities . . .  there’s a lot more complexity added to these portfolios.”

He avoided saying whether either of the ministers had done anything wrong, despite multiple questions about why they deserved the demotions — particularly Lee, who had been an MP for 16 years and held the media portfolio for the National Party since 2017.

Lee’s removal from cabinet was a “recognition that there is a lower workload” and did not mean she would not return to cabinet at a later date, he said, but changes in the media industry had “moved quicker, faster, sooner and as a result I want to make sure that there is a good senior cabinet minister responsibility around the issues”.

On disability issues, he said there had been “a habit now” of cost overruns and poor financial management, but there was “innately more complexity” in both portfolios.

He was questioned over whether the ministers had requested the portfolios’ removal, and said “ultimately this was my decision”.

When asked if it was a warning shot to his caucus, he said he was just a person who “will adapt very quickly and dynamically to changing circumstances and situations”.

‘How I roll, lead’
“This is how I roll, this is how I lead . . .  I appreciate this may not be the way things have been done in the past here, but expect this to happen going forward as well.”

He had spoken to the relevant ministers about the decision earlier in the morning, and it had been a “tough day” for them, he said.

“It’s understandable . . .  it is disappointing if you’re the individual, but the reality is they know that they are really valued by our team, we have full confidence in them, they’re doing a good job on their other portfolios and they have important contributions to make.”

Luxon said he had informed both his coalition partners. Asked if he would have the authority to use the same approach with them, he said “I’m the prime minister and I determine ultimately the performance of my cabinet ministers”.

He said they had a “very strong cadre” of women at the heart of the government doing good jobs.

In his earlier statement, Luxon said it had “become clear in recent months that there are significant challenges in the media sector. Similarly, we have discovered major financial issues with programmes run by the Ministry of Disabled People”.

“I have come to the view it is important to have senior cabinet ministers considering these issues.”

‘Significant synergies’
He said there were “significant synergies” between Goldsmith’s Arts, Culture and Heritage portfolio and the Media role he would be taking up.

He said he had asked Upston to pick up the disability role because Whaikaha, the Ministry of Disabled People, was a departmental agency within the Ministry of Social Development.

“This will free Penny Simmonds up to focus on the Environment portfolio and the major changes she is progressing to improve tertiary education,” he said.

Lee retains her Economic Development, Ethnic Communities and Associate ACC roles as a minister outside cabinet.

Simmonds, who remains outside cabinet, retains Environment, Tertiary Education and Skills, and Associate Social Development and Employment.

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

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

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

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

Warner Bros Discovery will struggle to retain viewers in New Zealand if it has no news operation, Newshub journalist Paddy Gower predicts, as he continues his crusade for someone to save at least part of its newsroom.

A grim 48 hours for news media has resulted in many jobs being lost in the sector — as TV3 confirmed the closure of Newshub, and TVNZ announced it was going ahead with axing its current affairs flagship Sunday, consumer affairs Fair Go and two news bulletins.

About 250 jobs are being lost in the shutdown of Three’s national news service, which will close in July.

Gower told RNZ Morning Report Warner Bros Discovery needed to get on and do a deal for another party to take over the news bulletin.

He was among seven senior Newshub journalists who pushed back against the company’s proposal and put forward their own plan.

The proposal, led by his colleague Michael Morrah, was “radical”, “aggressive” and would have pared the news operation back to the bone, he said.

It centred on the 6pm bulletin which brought in a lot of advertising revenue, retain the website and would later build up the digital operation.

“Basically it was a cutdown radical proposal to hang on to the 6pm bulletin and find digital solutions out into the future.”

While management gave them access to figures and helped them in other ways they ultimately decided not to go ahead.

He said when the closure was confirmed, there was a feeling of “the weight of history” at the loss of a taonga which Kiwis would miss when it disappeared.

“It’s gonna be a dark time for news in this country,” he said.

Gower said Warner Bros Discovery would have “a helluva time” keeping viewers without Newshub providing news and current affairs.

“We tried. That’s the Kiwi way. That’s the Newshub way.”

He said another media company, such as Stuff or NZME, could now come in and further their own news brand and their reputation by saving part of a significant news operation.

They would oversee the making of a 6pm news bulletin that would be sold to Warner Bros Discovery and in the process be working with one of the world’s leading media companies.

“That has to be a possibility . . . They would be seen to be saving news in New Zealand and that’s a big ups for them . . .

“The company that is able to get that deal done …. is going to get some incredible journalists on board to help them do it,” Gower said.

It would probably save about 40 to 50 jobs, he said.

Warner Brothers Discovery declined to be interviewed by Morning Report.

Broadcasting Minister accused of lack of vision
Former head of news at TV3 Mark Jennings believed Broadcasting Minister Melissa Lee was “all at sea” as the country veered towards a media crisis.

He found her response to the Newshub closure confusing and did not believe the cabinet paper she has been working on would provide anything beneficial.

“I think you’re likely to have three parties, New Zealand First, ACT and National, all with different points of view and I can’t see them agreeing on any forward course of action, particularly not with Melissa Lee who appears to have no vision here at all.”

Jennings said he was notsurprised the Morrah-Gower plan did not succeed, because employers had considered other options and then made up their minds before the consultation period began.

If an offer from an outside organisation did get the go-ahead, it would be a “basic product” and would be “news-light”, he said.

It might be shot on i-Phones and edited by journalists and would not resemble Newshub’s current flagship bulletin.

While both the pandemic and social media had lowered the quality threshold of what viewers might accept, it would still be compared to what TVNZ was screening.

“The challenge will be for them to hold on to their ratings and more importantly, their share. Their share has been decreasing over time and if it gets too much lower, they’ll find themselves back at square one really.”

Minister Lee was unwilling to be interviewed by Morning Report.

On Wednesday, she refused to tell RNZ once again what her plans to reform the sector were, citing cabinet confidentiality.

She said she was focused on ensuring New Zealand’s media industry was sustainable and modernised, and she was looking at reviewing the Broadcasting Act.

Although she has written a cabinet paper, she would not say what was in it.

Lee said she had talked to international companies on how they could support and increase New Zealand screen production, but it would not include a quota.

She said it would not have helped the situation at Newshub.

Not much scope for NZ on Air
New Zealand on Air chief executive Cam Harland said the agency had a limited ability to intervene because its remit was to provide funding for a large number of audiences across a range of genres.

He heads the agency responsible for distributing public funds but its budget isn’t nearly enough to address shortfalls.

Daily television news was expensive to produce, so he considered it unlikely NZ on Air would help much, he told Morning Report.

The loss of jobs and talent was “monumental” and NZ on Air bosses intended to meet with TVNZ and Newshub as well as senior journalists, such as Jennings, to get more information before making any decisions.

“We absolutely want to help . . .  so I guess our view now is: Can we be more innovative with what we’re funding, can we get more bang for the buck?”

The organisation was also faced with reviewing its spending in line with the government’s requirements for the public sector.

Union files claim against TVNZ

The union representing journalists has filed a claim against TVNZ alleging the company breached its own consultation requirements in its job cuts process.

E Tu’s negotiation specialist, Michael Wood, said the broadcaster should have involved its employees before the proposal was presented.

Talks were continuing with the Employment Relations Authority to see if a legal case could be heard as quickly as possible.

“It’s an urgent matter now . . . We’ll be trying to get an outcome there as soon as possible and we want to see an outcome that respects the process.”

He said mediation between the parties might be a part of the process.

While the union and employees had a small victory with a handful of jobs being saved, there was still “a massive loss of capacity” with the axing of several programmes.

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

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