Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I will just respond to Senator Macdonald's comments and, I think, additional questions inherent in that. There are a few things. Firstly, producing local television is always expensive. That is why you get the ABC and commercial networks buying stuff from overseas. For instance, for Channel Ten, I do not know how much The Bold and the Beautiful actually costs to bring into the country, but presumably it is not very much compared to, say, producing their flagship current affairs shows or news program, The Project.

One of the issues has been that this is a case where the market has been modified by virtue of the operation of section 43A in the context of those requirements for local content. We know that the Seven Network's Today Tonight program is no longer running on the eastern seaboard but has been kept alive and is still doing very well in Western Australia and South Australia. This is not because of any legislative requirements but because television stations will try and save money. I am not having a go at them for that, but the consequence is that local television production costs more than a program beamed in from Sydney or Melbourne. There is an anomaly in the legislation, in my view, given the way section 43A was operating. And there was an intention for it to be further reviewed but that review was never completed. I have made reference to the Australian Broadcasting Tribunal's 1989 report Broadcasting in Australia. All I am trying to do with this amendment is to bring at least South Australia in line to deal with that particular issue.

The other issue is that producing local television content is quite different now than 20 or 30 years ago. A Betacam costs about $100,000. You can have broadcast quality equipment for $6,000 or $7,000, which journalists in the Southern Cross Network use out of Port Lincoln, Whyalla, Port Augusta and Port Pirie, and they seem to be able to put together a very comprehensive news bulletin. So I think the media has changed and it is just convenient to drop South Australia from that by virtue of a lack of a requirement in section 43A. I hope that answers Senator MacDonald's questions, but I think he has raised some very important issues. In terms of local advertisers, as long as they have got the viewers there they do not care whether they are watching The Bold and the Beautiful or the local news bulletin; what they are interested in is the number of eyes on the television set.