The following article was published in "The Guardian", newspaper of the Communist Party of Australia in its issue of Wednesday, June 21st, 2000. Contact address: 65 Campbell Street, Surry Hills. Sydney. 2010 Australia. Phone: (612) 9212 6855 Fax: (612) 9281 5795. CPA Central Committee: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> "The Guardian": <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Webpage: http://www.cpa.org.au> Subscription rates on request. ****************************** ABC PRIVATISATION Two leaked reports reveal that the new ABC management is preparing steps which will strip the national broadcaster of all vestiges of independence. A planned restructure will result in increased outsourcing of programming. A former Walt Disney corporation marketing guru has been hired to pursue private sector investment and profits. by Marcus Browning These moves are in line with the Howard Government's competition policy which provides the ways and means to breakup publicly- owned bodies into small entities and then privatising them piece by piece. The restructure plan, which has not yet been made public, will see ABC program makers hived off into production "cells" where each will have to administer their own budgets and compete with each other to sell their programs to ABC radio and television. The reason for the sacking of senior programming and network managers during the recent period, with the head of marketing to follow hot on their heels, is now clearer. ABC management, heavily weighted with Howard Government appointees, is clearing the way for a major demolition job. Last week ABC managing director Jonathan Shier -- who was recruited by the Government from commercial television in the US -- unashamedly exposed his employment brief by emphasising higher ratings as a major objective. As for the Disney recruit, Keith Bales, his assignment is nothing less than shifting the focus of the ABC to "issues related to maximisation revenue opportunities". Bales' speciality is in sales, merchandising and international marketing. He is to "provide advice to ABC Enterprises in support of investment strategies and relevant commercial opportunities". Funding cuts Massive funding cuts since the Government took office in 1996 have shaken the ABC to its core as an independent broadcaster, while the 1997 Mansfield Review put in motion the wheels by which the all out attack on the ABC was to proceed. The review, headed by businessman Bob Mansfield, the current chairman of Telstra, followed devastating Government budget cuts in the 1996-97 budget ($11 million) and 1997-98 ($55 million). Putting Government thinking into words Mansfield proposed that ABC programming be funded by selling ABC property and cutting other services. He pushed for increased outsourcing knowing its inevitable outcome; staff cuts and the closure and sale of ABC studios, leaving the ABC with a diminishing television production base. The result is fewer programs which seriously attempt to reflect Australia's culture, diversity and history. By 1998, as a result of financial cutbacks, the ABC produced a mixture of outsourced programs, co-productions and some in-house productions. In May, 1998, Communications Minister Richard Alston forecast the current break-up with a list of demands aimed at giving the Government more control over the ABC. They included the ABC having a separate editorial monitoring policy unit; so-called "independent" advisory panels to review program performance; a programs complaints mechanism; more "public accountability"; and a monitoring of "balance and accuracy". So, by early 1999 the ABC had in train plans to sell its land and property in Brisbane, Canberra and Perth and its production site at Gore Hill in Sydney. There is now an undisguised focus on ratings -- the ultimate determinate of the dollars advertisers pay networks -- with ABC management trumpeting that the ABC's ratings have "never been higher". But these precious high ratings, with the exception of the "SeaChange" series, are all for imported programs. ABC's obligation Quentin Dempster, ABC presenter and former staff representative board member, pointed out that Shier should be supported if his aim is to develop more Australian content, but if it's the intention to go with more imported programs this would go against the ABC's obligation in its charter to provide "innovative programming". "We're all for building audience for Australian content", said Mr Dempster, "but the fact is we haven't got the money to do it." Radio Australia A sinister development has emerged out of the sell-off of Radio Australia. In 1998 the Government closed Radio Australia's Cox Peninsula transmitters which resulted in the loss of ABC broadcasts to significant parts of Asia, including China, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos and Indonesia. The Howard Government has now sold the transmitters to the religious organisation Christian Voice, an indication not only of the Government's privatisation agenda but of its Christian fundamentalist leanings. Part of the deal includes Christian Voice, a subsidiary of the British corporation Christian Vision, leasing the transmitter's "excess capacity" back to the ABC. In other words, taxpayers' money will be used to subsidise Christian Voice's takeover of a publicly-owned asset. Christian Vision carries substantial broadcasts into southern Africa and south America. "There are cost implications", said enthusiastic ABC chairman, Donald McDonald, a Government-appointee and close friend of Prime Minister Howard, "and we will need help and encouragement from the Government in that regard. But I think this is a moment full of possibilities for Radio Australia." There are cultural and political implication also. The $17 million- a-year founder of Christian Vision, Bob Edmiston, admits there are "Muslim sensitivities" in the region, but nonetheless, "Our objective is to introduce people to Jesus." Christian Voice has told the ABC it wants strict editorial control over all broadcasts from the Cox transmitters. Comment Asked by "The Guardian" to comment, Peter Symon, General Secretary CPA said that "the sale of the ABC's transmitters to Christian Voice is absolutely scandalous and disgusting. Asia is a largely non-Christian region and the sort of message that Christian Voice is going to pour into Asia may well further aggravate tensions between Australia and Asian countries. "There are already religious tensions and conflicts in Indonesia between Christians and Muslims and Christian Voice, who will side with the Christian communities, could well further increase such conflicts." ******************************************************************** -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
