Television New Zealand Amendment Bill

I am very pleased to continue my call on this part of the bill. We were discussing issues around the archiving of TVNZ works under this part, which inserts new section 57A. One of the points I want to make is that TVNZ and its predecessor have a very proud history of making good-quality public service broadcasting content. In fact, I started my career as a young New Zealand Broadcasting Corporation reporter in the mid-1970s, working on programmes like Town and Around, which was the regional television current affairs programme for Wellington and the wider region. Other members of the Committee may recall a similar version called The South Tonight, and in the Auckland region it was called Top Half. Those programmes sparked the careers of a number of illustrious broadcasters. That was the environment we were working in.

But the question I want to ask the Minister of Broadcasting tonight is what access New Zealanders will have, should they wish to watch any of those past archived programmes, and others. I think of programmes like Country Calendar, which endures to this day. In fact, it is about the only TVNZ programme that has survived from that era through to the present day, with a number of permutations but still very popular. I still well remember probably its best-known episode—a spoof programme done around 1 April, featuring turkeys in gumboots. This was not a visit by the National caucus to rural New Zealand. This was a programme around a spoof that supposedly this turkey farm had put all of its stock in gumboots. That is the sort of programme people still enjoy, but those programmes need a vehicle. They need a channel that will screen them. Of course, we have seen under this Minister of Broadcasting the loss already of TVNZ 6 to become a commercial music channel. Some of us with an interest in the broadcasting sphere thought that maybe that is the cost of being in a recession. Maybe that might be what we have to give away to maintain a non-commercial TVNZ channel, and maybe TVNZ 7 might still have a future. But a month ago the Minister announced that TVNZ 7 would go off air next year and that the funding for that channel would not be renewed in any shape or form, and there are even questions around whether TVNZ was asked for that funding or was trying to find that funding itself.

We are now providing under new section 57A that archived works will be available for public viewing, but I would like to ask the Minister what medium or channel TVNZ would use to put on air archived content. Those programmes have their place. People I know watch things like past British sitcoms. It is a very small stream of audience, but still it is a popular subset. Of course, those programmes are available only on the Sky network. What we are talking about is past New Zealand content, content that has been funded by us as taxpayers, by us as shareholders in TVNZ, when it became a more commercially oriented company. Given that the main premise of this bill is that TVNZ shall have a focus only on commercial function—that is, to make a profit—where will the public viewing of New Zealand content, provided for under this bill, be screened? My suspicion and belief is that although this part of the bill is making this content available for public viewing, in fact it will not be for what we might consider public viewing—that is, viewing available to all New Zealanders. It may be available to people who have Sky subscriptions, and that leaves 2 million New Zealanders, even with the predominance of Sky, who would not be able to see the very content that this part of the bill suggests they will be able to see.

The two channels that were available to show New Zealanders that sort of content are going off air, or have already gone off air, under this Minister. I think that is extraordinarily unfortunate. Those channels were to provide the platforms for TVNZ to have a presence in the digital age, which is another essential element of this bill. We saw the creation of the FreeView platform, to provide an alternative to subscription television. People had a choice. In fact we are getting shrinking choices under this bill. Even under this part, which suggests there may be more capacity for New Zealanders to see some of their own content, created in the past and put in the vaults out at Avalon, that content will not, I believe, be able to be seen by at least half of the New Zealand population because the platforms they would have been able to see them on are being whittled away by this Government.

I would like to note that in an interview the Minister gave to Morning Report about a month ago, as he was explaining the demise of TVNZ 7, he mentioned how everybody would be getting quality programming from many different sources, including the internet, in the future, which of course is true. But we have to ask where the role for public service broadcasting is in that, and whether there will be, under TVNZ—an important question for the Minister—a capacity to show on the internet, at least, some of this archived content. Will New Zealanders be able to see that, or, as I suspect, will we have to pay for that privilege, whether via the internet or via Sky, because TVNZ is simply told that its only function is to make a good dividend for the Government? The idea that the internet creates content is a bit of a misnomer anyway. Internet providers, or those who use the internet, tend to take content, mash it up, and do their own things with it. It is not actually a vehicle for creating content; it is a vehicle for relaying content, most particularly. As mentioned, this bill, supposedly, will allow New Zealanders to see their archived works, in a public viewing sense, but nothing in this bill spells out where that actually will be provided for.

I also draw attention to some of the leading broadcasting academics, who have written to the Minister and to the Government over the axing of TVNZ 7, which, of course, they saw would have been one of the prime vehicles—in fact the remaining prime vehicle—for the public viewing of archived works. But, of course, from next year, from about this time next year, under this Government, there will be no TVNZ 7; there will be no channel to allow New Zealanders, other than those taking out a Sky subscription, to see the content they have paid for. Those academics have noted that every other OECD country, bar Mexico, has a public service broadcasting television channel—at least one. We like to regard ourselves as a First World nation, and one of the measures of that is having—members opposite can believe it, or not—a State channel, at least one, that has a requirement to provide a sometimes non-commercial, sometimes lightly commercial, and sometimes commercial, channel, but at least one that has the mandate to regard itself as providing more than a dividend stream to the Government. But here we are, in this part of the bill, looking at screening, supposedly, some of the very content New Zealanders have a right to see, which is some of the content Māori Television is picking up in a very clever, low-budget way, and showing us. They are programmes like Māori Television’s version of It’s in the Bag. We can see the Māori equivalent now on Māori Television—

💬 Kris Faafoi: Sam wants the money.

That is fine, because I am not going to give him the bag. It would be unfair. But the point is that Māori Television is providing that kind of programming, and we will not be able to see the original, should we wish, on our State-owned channel because it will not be there. We will be able to go and watch it on Sky, maybe via the Heartland channel—

I too, like the previous speaker Brendon Burns, will focus in the Television New Zealand Amendment Bill on new section 57A, which is all about making archived works available for public viewing. It is supremely ironic that for many years there have been negotiations to allow the creation of the wonderful, wonderful library of archival material made over many years while TVNZ was a public service television broadcaster. For years there have been negotiations about how we could make that archival material available on television. An agreement was negotiated to allow archival programmes to be screened for public viewing. The irony is, as the previous speaker pointed out, that this wonderful treasure of archival material, made by public service television, will not be able to be screened on TVNZ, on free-to-air television, because this bill will turn TVNZ into a commercial broadcaster stripped of any public service interests or obligations. It will exist to chase ratings and to return a dividend to the Government.

This totally commercially focused new entity that Television New Zealand will be once this legislation is passed will not screen archival material, because that material will not rate like some blockbuster, imported American programme. As the previous speaker said, we will not see that material. Having spent all this time negotiating for the wonderful collection of archival works to be screened, they will not be screened or made available for public viewing. It will not be available on free-to-air television once TVNZ 7 has also gone next year.

Ironically, the only place we might be able to see this archival footage is on pay television, on Sky television. It is extraordinary and ironic that Television New Zealand, a publicly owned broadcaster, told us recently in the Commerce Committee that its main area of growth was in developing material and channels for pay television. A free-to-air broadcaster, which TVNZ still is at this moment, sees as its main raison d’être the making of channels and programmes for pay television—for Sky television. Quite clearly, as I have mentioned before in this debate, the agenda is to move away from free-to-air television in New Zealand—just as we are now moving in this bill away from public service television—to pay television and commercial television. It is ironic that this will happen.

It is interesting that Brendon Burns said that he worked in regional television for TVNZ. I did not know that. I too worked in regional television in TVNZ when it was a genuinely public service organisation. When I worked for TVNZ for 2 or 3 years on Eyewitness News, etc.—

💬 Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga: Did you?

—yes—there was a significant current affairs department, there was regional television, and there was a whole documentary department. Documentaries were screened every week and watched by a very large segment of the population. Some of the highest-rating programmes were documentaries. When we look 20 years later at what Television New Zealand is today, we ask where the documentaries are. Where are the New Zealand - made documentaries? Where is the current affairs television—the in-depth current affairs television?

Unfortunately, Television New Zealand is but a shadow now of its former self. In this bill it is stripped of all its public service obligations. Under this bill it is a nakedly commercial organisation.

I move, That the question be now put.

I am pleased to take another call in the Committee stage of the Television New Zealand Amendment Bill, and to talk to the section with regard to archived works. I will revisit what I see as being the critical issue in this bill—that is, the issue of the public good. We have talked about that in relation to a number of issues, a number of subjects, throughout the discussion.

As we know, this bill has two main intentions. The first, which Labour fundamentally opposes, is to remove the charter and replace it with a minimalist statement of functions. The second is to create the scheme that has been talked about tonight, so that those publicly funded works—those very important publicly funded works; the works that are part of our cultural heritage and the identity of who we are as a nation—that were made before 1989, and that are now held in the TVNZ archive, can be made available for rescreening. That scheme was called the archived works scheme. I say—and it is important that I do get the chance to say this in this debate—that that scheme has some merit. There was a very interesting discussion in the select committee about this issue. In fact, much of the discussion concerned how to make the scheme possibly work. Unfortunately the other major part of the bill, which is the removal of the charter, was just unacceptable—absolutely unacceptable—and it meant that Labour could not support the bill.

I will talk a little bit about the archived works scheme and what it represented, because it is worthy of some discussion, particularly giving credit to the number of submitters and the discussion had with them, and the notice the select committee took. The select committee did a lot of work on this issue, and I acknowledge the work the officials put into this bill.

The archived works scheme was described as proposing and enabling a rescreening of those works that, to date, had been unavailable for reuse because of the need to negotiate with the multiple contract holders. It is important to take this seriously, because it was about seeking to find a balance between the public-good objective—I will say that again: the public-good objective—of releasing those works for current and future generations to see, and acknowledging the rights of those who were contracted to work on those programmes.

There were 48 submissions; 16 of them were essentially pro forma submissions, but there were a number of important submissions from different agencies. Those agencies took this issue quite seriously, and as a result of that discussion the select committee made a number of changes to the bill in its report back to the House. I will briefly touch on them, in order to give weight to the work the select committee did. In those changes the committee recommended that the definition of “archived work” be changed to make it clear that it would apply only to works made on or before 27 May 1989 for which TVNZ owned the whole copyright. The select committee also recommended that not only must archived works be screened free to the viewer—I will repeat that: free to the viewer—but they must not be screened between the hours of 6 p.m. and 10.30 p.m. on any day of the week on Television One and TV2. That provision was essentially about making sure that profit was not being gained from that screening.

The rights of persons with an interest in archived work were to cease. The select committee recommended it be made clear that the cessation of rights of persons with an interest in archived work would apply only to the contractual rights in copyright under the Copyright Act 1994, and that oral and performers’ rights would remain unaffected. The select committee also recommended that the fund must contain a sum determined—

I move, That the question be now put.

Mr Chair, thank you very much for the opportunity to speak to Part 2 of the Television New Zealand Amendment Bill. I will follow the lead of a number of speakers before me, and concentrate on new section 57A, which relates to the rescreening of archived material.

There is a wealth of archived material in the Avalon Studios vault; I have been there myself. I think it is a good thing that New Zealanders will have the opportunity to see some of the material that has been locked away in that vault for some time, and also that there will be a framework set up to ensure that those who may have claim to royalties, should their work be rescreened, will be able to do that.

As my colleague Clare Curran said, the legislation is very specific as to what is considered archived material. It includes programmes or series that were produced before 27 May 1989. We agree that these shows should be screened again. I have a vague memory of some of them, such as Close to Home. Mortimer’s Patch is something I do not really recall—

💬 Peseta Sam Lotu-Iiga: But you remember the McDonald’s.

Yes; I was too busy with the McDonald’s. Something that probably the member for Maungakiekie would remember better is Gloss—I am sure he was a big fan of Gloss at the time. Hudson and Halls was maybe a show he enjoyed, but I am sure, judging by some of his contributions in the Committee, he was more a fan of Billy T. James.

As we have said, it is fantastic to see some of this material rescreened for nostalgia opportunities. It is an opportunity for younger New Zealanders to see some of what has shaped New Zealand in terms of what is on our screens. It is an opportunity for us to see that and have a sense of identity.

But, as our previous speakers have asked, what will be done with this content? What exactly will be done with this content, and who will be able to access it? The commentary on the bill sets out very clearly that programming can be rescreened by a provider of another delivery platform that has an agreement with TVNZ for the supply of that content. It goes on to state that the committee recommends a new section “to make it clear that an archived work screened under this section must be screened free of charge to the viewer. We believe that archived programmes constitute a public good, so the viewer should bear no cost.”

But, at the moment, what situation do we have? This content is being played on the Sky platform via TVNZ Heartland. That is pay-per-view television, so if people want to see some of this material that has been produced via the public broadcaster, TVNZ, which has been funded by New Zealand taxpayers over decades, people will have to fork out for it. As the Minister said, if that is in the public interest, which public is it? It is the paying public.

I have done a bit of research. The TVNZ Heartland platform is available on a basic Sky package, which costs $47.66 a month.

💬 Hon Lianne Dalziel: How much?

$47.66 a month. If people want to watch this stuff, using the current way to watch it via Sky, they will have to fork out $50 a month. That is hardly in the public interest of all New Zealanders.

How is it in the public interest under the current model? Under this Sky platform, the programming is supposed to be 100 percent local content. That is fine. It is supposed to be a celebration of New Zealanders and to show some of New Zealand’s finest shows, but it is only available to Sky subscribers. Not even FreeView subscribers have the ability to tune into TVNZ Heartland. If this is the model we will see in the future for TVNZ content—content that has been built up over decades, content that is very important in terms of educating future generations of New Zealanders about how New Zealand has progressed—and if the only way we will get it is via a pay-per-view television platform, then I think that it is a very sad day for New Zealand broadcasting indeed.

As I said, it is not available to all New Zealanders, and it costs $50 a month. Currently TVNZ has this archive, and what will be done with it?

The CHAIRPERSON (Lindsay Tisch): You are well off-track.

I think this is a fantastic opportunity to open up the archive, as I said before. We can take a look at the past and see how our nation has grown through some of these programmes. Some of them are high-quality; some of them will be of questionable quality.

I am glad that this legislation does not include news content. It applies basically only to content that has come through productions. It is good that those who have worked on it, those who have come up with the ideas, will have fair compensation for it.

I move, That the question be now put.