Scott Ludlam (WA, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That the Senate—

(a) notes that:

(i) the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is Australia's most trusted news and current affairs broadcaster,

(ii) the ABC is an extremely well loved national institution, and that independent opinion polls regularly reveal high levels of public satisfaction with the broadcaster, and

(iii) the Coalition has cut funding for the ABC in the past, including an 11 per cent cut in 1998 under Prime Minister John Howard;

(b) calls on the Government to:

(i) commit to protecting funding to the ABC in the forthcoming budget, and

(ii) cease threatening the ABC's editorial independence; and

(c) orders that there be laid on the table, by the Minister representing the Minister for Communications (Senator Fifield) by 3 March 2014, the 2006 KPMG report into the adequacy and efficiency of ABC funding commissioned by the Howard Government.

I seek leave to make a very brief statement.