The Hui, now in its 10th season, is hosted by Julian Wilcox. Photo / The Hui
Public funding for long-running current affairs show The Hui has been cut, but its production company hopes it can be saved in a pared-back form. Meanwhile, Te Karere is also set to face a funding cutback.
Māori news and current affairs TV show The Hui has missed out on more than half of its annual public funding, forcing it to rely on other taxpayer funding and a reduced number of episodes next year in order to save the show.
Maori broadcasting funding agency Te Māngai Pāho (TMP) confirmed today that The Hui – which received $1 million in funding from TMP last year – would not be funded under the agency’s news and current affairs umbrella next year.
The decision comes as the funding agency changes up some of its news and current affairs funding as it looks to support more digital initiatives and collaboration within the sector.
This includes further support for Māori regional news platforms and a new national hub to distribute news content to media companies.
The changes come in the context of TMP facing an overall budget cut, from $66 million to $50 million, next year.
These changes also seem likely to lead to funding cuts or format/content changes for the likes of TVNZ’s weekday Te Karere and Sunday morning Marae shows, which received $2.77m and $1.5m from TMP this year.
For instance, if Te Karere receives more content from the regional providers/national hub, it is likely to receive less direct funding from TMP.
TMP says it is confident Te Karere will continue to screen.
“We’re not dead in the water,” The Hui’s producer, Great Southern Television founder Phil Smith, said today.
Smith said the show – which screens weekly on Three and Whakaata Māori as well as the Stuff website and social/digital channels such as YouTube – was produced by a highly motivated team.
“We believe that Māori current affairs is so important – The Hui is radically shared on so many media sources and is such a pivotal provider of information to the Māori constituency. We believe we have to keep it going. It’s our duty, especially with an election year coming up.
“We’ve put together a plan. It’s a really robust plan.”
That plan involves reducing the number of annual episodes from 40 to 26 next year, based on the show retaining its separate NZ on Air public funding.
NZ on Air, which funded $788,000 on top of TMP’s $1m in 2025, will announce any future funding for The Hui next month.
“We understand the limitations on TMP,” Smith said.
“They are going to face a funding battle for next year. We’ve had a terrific relationship with them – we know that we can also talk to them about potential smaller Hui initiatives next year."
Smith said his company was focused on broadcasting the show through to the general election to “give Māori voters the issues and information they deserve”.
The cutbacks to The Hui come amid a broader funding shake-up within the Māori broadcasting sector.
Te Māngai Pāho is reshaping funding for some news and current affairs projects, committing so far to funding at least six regional Māori news providers and a national hub to distribute that content to other media.
The system is designed to create better collaboration within the sector.
“We’re trying to get a little bit more of a collaborative ecosystem,” TMP chief executive Larry Parr said. “The Māori sector has been funding effectively three national news services. And that is not sustainable in the environment of sinking budgets for us.
“What we’ve done is move to a model where we are funding regional providers and a national hub.”
The regional hubs would be aligned with existing iwi radio stations in the South Island, Waikato, Eastern Bay of Plenty, Northland, Taranaki and Rotorua and would be provided with more support to ensure they produced journalism to a standard required.
There was also potential to add more hubs where there were geographic gaps.
TMP was still in an RFP (request for proposals) process with the potential provider of a national hub. It could be a TVNZ or a Whakaata Māori (Māori Television) or one of a number of other providers, Parr said.
The national hub would receive the content, making it available for accredited publishers, including mainstream media firms, to use as they wished.
But it also means that a show like TVNZ’s Te Karere – which can rely on the content from the national hub – might not receive as much direct funding next year as it has done in the past.
Shows such as TVNZ’s Te Karere and Marae are still in an RFP process and yet to hear about their funding for next year.
It is understood that Marae has proposed continuing as a full te reo Māori language current affairs show.
Parr said decisions on funding for these shows would be made when the TMP board meets later this month.
“The Māori population is a relatively young population, and the majority of our population gets their content from YouTube,” he said.
“Our responsibility is to make sure that we are actually reaching Māori audiences. There’s no doubt that programmes like Te Karere and Marae also have significant audiences ... we’ve got to get a good balance.“
Editor-at-Large Shayne Currie is one of New Zealand’s most experienced senior journalists and media leaders. He has held executive and senior editorial roles at NZME including Managing Editor, NZ Herald Editor and Herald on Sunday Editor and has a small shareholding in NZME.
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