Television New Zealand Bill

Now we move to one of the most gripping parts of this bill, and that is the schedules and the consequential amendments. Since so much has been deleted, schedule 1 is a lot shorter than was originally intended. It makes reference to the Broadcasting Act, so it seems timely, once again, to discuss political interference, which is one of the key things that really worries TVNZ staff. They know that under the present regime they are already under pressure to put on the air stories that show the Government in a good light. They tell me that much pressure was put on during the editing of the Ella Henry story, and that much pressure was put on reporters when they were covering the Susan Bathgate double-dipping story.

💬 Rodney Hide: Triple-dipping!

I apologise to Mr Hide. It was triple-dipping.

💬 Rodney Hide: Don’t sell me short.

Yes; I underestimated that. Pressure was put on when TVNZ was covering Tariana Turia’s holocaust comments. Quite clearly, there have been situations where journalists feel that they have been very much constrained when it comes to providing objective news reports, and in particular, news reports that are critical of the present Government. The last thing a journalist wants is a call from the ninth floor after a story—and the calls are not just from the ninth floor. Reporters talk about getting calls from Dr Armstrong after particular pieces.

I am sure that members can imagine how reporters feel when, after they have put hard work into a particular story, checked their facts and got their clips, and the story has been screened, they suddenly get a call from the chairman to ask them why they ran that particular story. It has happened. I would like to know why, for example, TVNZ took until today to run the John Tamihere story. That story ran on Friday on TV3. I say that TVNZ is already very cautious. It is already pretty worried about how it represents the Government, and it is already pretty nervous about complaints from the ninth floor and, in particular, the press secretaries who work for the Prime Minister. All of that constrains a democratic use of media. This bill is really designed to constrain TVNZ further. If anything, there will be less objective media coverage and a far more sanitised version of the sort of coverage we get of the Government.

In the second schedule there is a long list of land to be transferred from TVNZ to the new entity, Transmission Holdings Ltd. It is quite interesting to look down the list. There are two references to Waipareira. What does that remind members of?

💬 Dail Jones: Good old “John-Boy”.

Yes. I am wondering whether John Tamihere has had a look at this bill. I wonder what his view of it is and what he thinks it will do for his people. I am sure that he has a view. I am sure that he plans to share a number of his views with the House over the next few months because he has made a conscious decision—he has not come here to eat his lunch; he is going to make a difference to the people he purports to represent.

Schedule 2 also mentions the city of Wanganui. I wonder whether Jill Pettis has checked out whether the transferral of 2.2763 hectares is a positive move for her city. I suspect she is not even aware that reference is made to the city of Wanganui in this bill. I am sure that Mr Benson-Pope has not noticed that there is a transfer of land from Otago. When we look at the total amount of land that is being transferred, one of the big questions, of course, is: “Why are we transferring all this land, anyway?” Obviously the Government plans to sell BCL. Obviously the Government is packaging the land. It wants to put it across to a new entity and, finally, sell the lot. A lot of this, arguably, is part of the infrastructure of the country. If we look down the list we see that there are lots of very recognisable spots. There are some very recognisable areas of the country that, given that we now have the Resource Management Act, we would never be able to re-establish.

I rise to speak on schedule 2 in particular, which deals with the land transfer from TVNZ to Transmission Holdings Ltd. The list of assets is a list of the land holdings of TVNZ. TVNZ will no longer have the asset that constitutes its transmission arm—its properties and its land.

I would like to give the Committee an indication of how much land is in those substantial holdings. There is a valuable amount of land in the North Auckland land district, in the south Auckland district, and in the Hawke’s Bay district. In the Wellington district there are two huge areas—and they are prime real estate, as well. The list also includes the city of Wanganui, Masterton, Nelson, Westland, Canterbury, Otago, and Southland.

There is a huge amount of valuable land that can be prime real estate. When I look out of the window in my office, I look straight at a beautiful lump of land with houses almost to the top of it, but once that land is in that holding company, it will be a prime target for selling off. This Government has set up this bill to sell off those assets. Here we go again. We are back to the 1980s. The Labour Government of the 1980s set out to sell all the assets that New Zealand owned—the Crown jewels; the family silver—and we are about to see it happen again. Those assets and that land will be placed into a holding company—and it is not bound by the charter, so there is no requirement to keep them in Government hands or in the public purse.

That land is most desirable real estate. It is in prime positions and on prime vantage spots—

💬 Jill Pettis: It’s 2 hectares at Whiritoa.

There we go! Jill Pettis is squawking over there, trying to tell us that it is not so. That gives us a clear indication that it is what will actually happen.

💬 Dail Jones: She’s in the know.

She is in the know, and she does not want the rest of New Zealand to know that that is what is going to happen. We saw it happen in the 1980s when the Labour Government of the time carried out its social experiment. It sold off all our assets under the pretext that there would be a trickle-down effect. Well, we never saw a drop reach down to the general public. It all went off to the big corporates, who made a killing.

TVNZ will be left totally without assets and reliant on the public purse to continue in operation. Schedule 2 lists all the landholdings of TVNZ that are to be transferred into a lovely, convenient package that, in the future, will be sold. There is no doubt that this Government has that intention. It is heading in the same direction as the Labour Government of the 1980s. Under Roger Douglas, we saw every asset that New Zealand held sold off. As my colleague Craig McNair mentioned, one of New Zealand First’s founding principles is to stop the sale of land and to stop the sale of New Zealand’s assets. This bill is a clear example of the fact that this Government is about to do the same as the 1980s Labour Government. Government members are jittery. They are all squawking. Mr Hawkins is squawking. Clayton Cosgrove is squawking. They know that I am right—this land is going to be sold. It is in the perfect position to be sold off. This is a disaster.

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley): I call Stephen Franks.

💬 Jill Pettis: Where have you been for the last 20 years? You want to get out more.

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley): Order!

💬 Rodney Hide: I raise a point of order, Madam Chairperson. I am picking up on your point, Madam Chairperson, in support of you. If Jill Pettis would like to know where you have been for 20 years, she could ask you appropriately and in a private place, rather than scream it out in a way that takes the varnish off the walls of this great Chamber.

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley): I thank the member for his point of order. I have called for order, and I have called Stephen Franks.

The first schedule of the bill as reported back from the select committee states, under “State-Owned Enterprises Act 1986”: “Omit from the First Schedule the words ‘Television New Zealand Limited’. Omit from the Second Schedule the words ‘Television New Zealand Limited’.” This bill takes TVNZ out of a reasonably thoughtful, well-developed, identifiable corporate structure and makes it what the select committee agreed was a hybrid. In a very plaintive rebuttal in advance, the select committee stated: “the majority of us believe that shareholding Ministers’ ability to direct the TVNZG subsidiaries is sufficiently provided for ... TVNZG should therefore have the direct link to the TVNZG subsidiaries.” The committee went through the dividend-paying provisions and then said that it thought what was being proposed would work. It said: “Government members believe that the structure proposed is a workable hybrid model.” That is like saying it is neither fish nor fowl, but we think it might work; or saying that although it is a sort of karaoke company lip-syncing its way through the system, it might work.

The State-Owned Enterprises Act, of course, suddenly became more appropriate for Transmission Holdings Ltd, and after the select committee had reported, that company went back into the State-owned enterprises regime. Only Television New Zealand sits out in this lonely, “unusual hybrid”, as Treasury referred to it. Schedule 1 is the part that implements the legislation, taking Television New Zealand out of the State-Owned Enterprises Act. What is the effect of that? First, we lose the benefit of section 4. Many might say that that does not matter. Section 4 of the State-Owned Enterprises Act states that companies under that Act must be as profitable as comparable private businesses. That may be anathema to those on the left, who hate the idea of commercial success, profit, or return on assets, but it is really a problem for the competitors of, and the suppliers to, Television New Zealand. Once this company is out of the State-owned enterprise regime, as this schedule provides, it can essentially crush the independent producers. This company is no longer required to get a normal return on its investments. It can do anything it likes in the so-called pursuit of its charter, and it does not matter what happens to those it trades with or competes with. The legislation takes this company out of a regime that was supposed to intend that New Zealanders got a proper return on assets, and therefore that boards could not excuse poor performance, failure, or no returns by saying that they were pursuing higher objectives.

What else does it do? It takes Television New Zealand out of the section 7 regime, which means that Ross Armstrong’s little jaunt to Paris might well be something that he could justify without having to show that there was a normal commercial return. Section 7 states that State-owned enterprises can only contract for the delivery of social purposes if they do so on an arms-length basis and get proper consideration. It is a discipline so that Government cannot extract little benefits for its mates from State-owned companies without accounting for them. Taking the section out, and not replacing it with anything, means that when Ross Armstrong was off investigating Bulgarian—[Interruption]—programmes, dubbed in English, which he was exploring in Paris, he could say that those social services, or that particular advance, was something that the Government wanted him to do. He did not have to show a proper return on those endeavours; it was merely enough that the Government had expressed a desire to do them.

Taking Television New Zealand out of the State-Owned Enterprises Act makes that sort of conduct much easier, because there is no longer a section 7 to comply with. There is no longer a requirement that any of those so-called social services have to be paid for transparently by Government appropriation, or by payment from the other organisations that get the benefit. So maybe it was another Government organisation Dr Ross Armstrong had been appointed to—perhaps fishing—that was going to get the benefit.

There is an expression: “The devil is in the detail”, and it is certainly true in these two very boring-looking schedules. The exact detail, as the representative of New Zealand First outlined, is all of those assets that will be transferred into this stand-alone State-owned enterprise called Transmission Holdings Ltd—the transmission arm of Television New Zealand. There was a great eruption on the other side of the Chamber when Mr Catchpole suggested that the intention was to ready that company for sale. The Labour members shrieked “What rubbish!”, but not one single member from the Labour Party has spoken in this debate to tell us why the Government, at the last minute and in the eleventh hour, is separating off the transmission arm of Television New Zealand into a State-owned enterprise. The reason is not in the explanatory note. There is no explanation, and frankly, that is quite astonishing. This must be the only stand-alone State-owned enterprise that is being set up without even an explanatory note, or without one member of the Government bothering to tell us why they are doing it. It is quite scandalous, frankly.

The Green Party is very sad at having to take such a strong line, because we strongly support public service television. We were great supporters of the charter, because we think it is crucial that we have a broadcaster committed to promoting a New Zealand identity, New Zealand voices, and so forth. We want to see a Television New Zealand as strong, financially independent, and robust as possible, with a healthy income stream, with the ability to earn revenues from various activities, and be a politically independent member of the fourth estate. So we are very sad, because on the one hand we strongly support that, but on the other hand we believe that the eleventh-hour amendment to separate off the transmission arm of Television New Zealand—which has never been explained—will undermine the intention of this bill to make Television New Zealand editorially driven and no longer totally preoccupied with advertising and revenue. That is its whole goal.

What will it do, now that the golden goose—the dividends from the transmission arm—have gone? Where will the revenue come from? Obviously, Television New Zealand will have to chase advertising, so that will undermine the very objectives of this bill. When it is not chasing advertising, it will be worrying whether its political masters will be giving it $10, $11, or $12 million for the next year, or whether some programme it has made has annoyed or offended a Minister, a Prime Minister, or someone in Government to such an extent that that revenue or direct Government funding will no longer come the following year. If it is not this Government, then it will be the next Government, and if is that next Government, it will not be giving any direct funding to Television New Zealand. So what will that company do then? Where will it get its revenue from then? Will it be just from advertising? Well, that is in direct contradiction to the aims and objectives of this bill.

Marc Alexander said that this is the “Thank God for United Future Bill!” because that party had stepped in to force the separation of the transmission arm. I can tell members that there is not one member in the independent industry I have spoken to who supports what United Future and Labour have done. Not one person I know understands why on earth, at the eleventh hour, those parties have done this, and why they are going to undermine the very noble objectives of this charter and this bill. I think it is very sad, and New Zealand First is absolutely right. The Minister of Finance intervened with the help of United Future so that we could ready the transmission arm—the 540-odd transmission sites around New Zealand—for sale. There is no other possible explanation for why this would have happened. No explanation has ever been given by Government members for this odd action.

Madam Chair, I thank you for taking affirmative action to award the call to me—an Asian, ethnic minority, female MP—over a handsome young Pākehā MP like Phil Heatley. This type of speech is good for bonding between our team members.

I rushed back from the airport to take a call in this very important debate, because the taxi driver who drove me from the airport to Parliament asked me a series of questions that I had no answer to. I promised him that I would pose the questions, and I assured him that the Labour MPs would surely take a call to answer his queries. He said: “Mrs Wong, ask the Labour Ministers or MPs why they are passing this bill in Parliament. Isn’t Television New Zealand doing very well? Is their hidden agenda to sell off Television New Zealand?” The taxi driver continued: “Mrs Wong, ask the Labour Ministers or MPs why they are always hell-bound to pass legislation that invariably doesn’t work in practice, and whenever there is a challenge in court, then everything gets tangled up in legal niceties?” He talks a lot of common sense. Taxi drivers understand. Television New Zealand was doing very well, and what did this Labour Government do? Once again, it has interfered in a State-owned enterprise that used to work very well. I am very concerned that the schedule removes Television New Zealand from the State-owned enterprises category. It means that TVNZ no longer has to operate as a professional, successful company.

I want to recall an incident that happened in the Commerce Committee about 2 years ago. Television New Zealand appeared in front of that committee during a financial review. I remember the newly appointed, but now ex-Chairman of Television New Zealand, Dr Ross Armstrong, saying that every time he turned on TVNZ, he seemed to see these American programmes, and that was why he was a bit concerned about its delivery on local content. At that stage, I said: “But Dr Ross Armstrong, in your 6-monthly report as the Chairman of TVNZ you actually stated that you were very proud that local content had exceeded 67 percent.”

The CHAIRPERSON (Ann Hartley): I ask the member to stick to the schedules.

This is to do with removing Television New Zealand from schedule 1, which is about State-owned enterprises. I said: “How can you claim in your statement that Television New Zealand is delivering 67 percent local content, and then complain?” He said he must have turned on the television at the wrong time.

I am trying to say that it worries me—and it should worry the public—that Television New Zealand is to be removed from the State-Owned Enterprises Act. That really means that it does not have to operate in a very businesslike, competent manner. It also implies that there is lots of room for interference from the Labour Government. As my colleague Katherine Rich said in the same schedule debate, what if the Labour Government says: “Hey, we really don’t want this State-owned enterprise to broadcast answers, or whatever, by the Hon John Tamihere.” He appears to be the only one in the Labour caucus who can think and speak for himself. The rest apparently have to check with advisers to Prime Minister Clark.

I move, That the question be now put.