Local telly quota content still in contention

The stick hovering over the backsides of broadcasters negotiating a New Zealand programme quota with the Government snapped before it could make contact.

Now it appears there was never any force behind the threat of making quotas mandatory.

Broadcasting Minister Steve Maharey stood up in Parliament last week and said his Government could not (as it has repeatedly stated it could) legislate to introduce quotas for television if a voluntary system failed to increase levels of local content.

A voluntary quota regime is on the way for free-to-air television broadcasters who, like radio stations, have set their own targets for more New Zealand content.

Maharey says an agreement has been signed with TVNZ, TV3, the Screen Producers and Directors Association, and New Zealand On Air which pledges the group - set up in December 2001 - to setting three-year targets for increased local programming.

Labour promised in 1999 it would introduce format-specific quotas for radio and free-to-air television "as soon as possible".

But if it knew international trade agreements would pose problems with introducing a mandatory system, why did it make the threats?

Maharey says the Government had wondered if there was a way to renegotiate the relevant trade agreement made in 1994 by National. "I think it turns out that the chances of us being able to get agreement around Gats [General Agreement on Trade and Services] now ... are very low. So we're reserved that right while we looked carefully at whether there is a possibility of doing it, but it's pretty clear to me that we may as well bury that one."

The Government never publicly raised the international trade issues surrounding quotas but, surprisingly, it did acknowledge them to the head of Pakuranga College's media studies department. In August 2000, then Broadcasting Minister Marian Hobbs replied to questions from Gordon Lawrence about the Government's broadcasting initiatives. She said the Government was aware of the "important issue with respect to the country's obligations under WTO agreements, and the impact they may have on ensuring an appropriate level of New Zealand content in our broadcasting services".

A few months later, Mrs Hobbs told Finance Minister Michael Cullen that work on local quotas was progressing and "for the present it may be assumed that some legislative action will be necessary".

It is difficult to know what work was done towards finding a way around the trade obligations.

The Herald received dozens of documents regarding the introduction of a quota system, following a request under the Official Information Act, but sections relating to New Zealand's international obligations were deleted, and a cabinet paper withheld for the same reason.

However, it was not just international hurdles the Government faced when talking quotas.

Commercial broadcasters TV3, Prime and Sky Television formed a coalition mid-2000 to fight the introduction of a compulsory quota - primarily attacking a quota model put up by the Screen Production and Development Association, the flag-bearer for independent producers and staunch proponent of mandatory quotas.

A solution was to establish a working party bringing together the main players - TVNZ, TV3, SPADA, and funding agency New Zealand on Air - to plan a voluntary system which everyone could agree upon.

In planning a brief for the group, Ministry of Culture and Heritage boss Martin Matthews wondered if it was worth noting the advantages of a voluntary scheme, for example "flexibility to set targets that reflect current and projected circumstances, industry buy-in to the targets, and its future-proofing value as it can't be undone by government.

"A critical issue for SPADA will, I think, be confidence that broadcasters can't opt out."

Matthews said something might be needed to persuade SPADA that a voluntary system would be more effective and sustainable.

A short time later, Matthews offered a ministry official a series of arguments before his meeting with SPADA.

"A mandatory regime will be controversial, if for no other reason than it will be opposed by the broadcasters. It will therefore be much more difficult to deliver this year if they [broadcasters] run a campaign against it, and it runs the risk of failure if the broadcasters choose to act in an uncooperative manner once in place."

In discussions about how the working group would approach a voluntary code, SPADA wanted to ensure the group set local content targets which would encourage increasing and ongoing commitment to independent production.

TVNZ and TV3, however, wanted a less prescriptive brief for the group's discussion.

TVNZ suggested "targets" be replaced with "objectives", while TV3 asked that a reference to "continuing commitment to the growth of local content, both in terms of quantity and diversity" speak of "quality" instead of "quantity".

Perhaps sensing it was all slipping away, Wellington television and film-maker Dave Gibson wrote to the Prime Minister a year ago and said a voluntary system "just won't work".

He cited the deal between Prime Television and Australia's Nine Network, which he said would mean considerably more Aussie programming on New Zealand TV.

"Examples of this type of foreign ownership and product supply arrangements will very likely increase over the next 10 years.

"And in the shifting landscape voluntary quotas will ultimately count for nothing."