Snowdon costs RNZ $400,000

Lynne Snowdon

Radio New Zealand has spent more than $400,000 in a dispute with its former news boss, Lynne Snowdon.

In papers presented to Parliament's commerce committee financial review of RNZ yesterday, it was revealed that $411,232 was spent on employment, defamation and other cases brought by Ms Snowdon.

Ms Snowdon spent two years on sick leave following a fallout with management at the state broadcaster.

Chief executive Peter Cavanagh revealed, under questioning by National's Pansy Wong, that the broadcaster had set aside funds to spend more on the case.

Up to $1.1 million had been set aside for defamation cases - $738,000 more than in 2004.

Mr Cavanagh said RNZ was facing five defamation cases, two were carried over from the previous year and three were new. "Some of the cases" involved Ms Snowdon.

"They are related to employment but they are defamation matters," Mr Cavanagh said.

"We're very confident about the HR and legal advice on all of those matters, and while we have stated the contingent liability we don't have any expectation of paying any money out."

RNZ fired Ms Snowdon last year. She then lost her bid for reinstatement, pending a full hearing of her claim.

Other staff matters were raised yesterday.

National broadcasting spokeswoman Georgina Te Heu Heu challenged Mr Cavanagh about his leadership style and quoted remarks made by outgoing presenter Linda Clark in the Listener.

Mr Cavanagh said he knew Linda Clark wanted to change careers, and denied that he was a "distant" manager.

He said proper channels should be followed.

"If they have something to discuss once it's been worked through the system, I'm always available."

He was a fan of Linda Clark and praised her performance, but said some of her quoted remarks were inaccurate.

An "extraordinary amount of interest" had been shown in the job, Mr Cavanagh said.

Yesterday's Dominion-Post reported that contenders were Sean Plunket, Gordon Harcourt, John Pagani and Peter Weir.

Mrs Te Heu Heu then quizzed Mr Cavanagh about Tom Frewen, who has just lost his contract for the Media Watch show after writing a piece for the National Business Review under the same title.

Mr Cavanagh said Mr Frewen's contract was terminated by a clause that allowed either party to end it with four weeks' notice, and not for conflict of interest.

"The context ... was about what we considered to be a fairly blatant breach of our editorial policy."

A total of 592,000 people tuned into RNZ last year - down from 606,100 the previous year. For National Radio the figure was 517,400 (518,100), Concert FM 159,300 (168,000).

- NZPA