Malarndirri McCarthy (NT, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

To give you some idea of the scope of the First Nations media sector, it includes over 230 radio broadcast sites coordinated by 35 licensed community-owned not-for-profit organisations. These radio services are able to reach around 320,000 First Nations people, including around 100,000 very hard to reach people in remote Indigenous communities, or approximately 48 per cent of the First Nations population. They broadcast live shows plus interviews, radio documentaries, news, emergency information, community events, government and other messaging within community broadcasting guidelines. These video and film production services create culture and language based content for broadcast and online distribution. In the TV sphere, we have NITV broadcasting nationally and local TV services at Goolarri TV at Broom and Larrakeyah TV at Darwin. ICTV satellite TV service reaches 240,000 remote households as well as their free-to-air regional locations.

In terms of news production, First Nations media is rich with national, regional and local news and current affairs services for broadcast as well as print and online news media such as the National Indigenous Radio Service, NIRS, with its national Indigenous news and Weekly News in Review, and Central Australian Aboriginal Media Association's news service, including its Strong Voices program. There's Koori Radio's news and current affairs programming, NITV News and Living Black. Print media include Koori Mail and National Indigenous Times, and there is a strong online presence with sites such as IndigenousX.

First Nations media organisations did have a strong social media following and published content online daily. These channels offer a wide range of programming, including news and current affairs, reporting from a First Nations' perspective in over 25 Indigenous languages nationally, including the first language of many people in remote communities. These First Nations media organisations want to keep going from strength to strength.

First Nations broadcasters and not-for-profit community organisations are providing a primary and essential service to their communities. Radio services reach nearly 50 per cent of the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population, but are prevented from providing a primary radio service to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people due to lack of funding and spectrum availability. The sector reaches significant audience share, with 91 per cent of people in remote Indigenous communities being regular listeners to radio services and watching ICTV at least once per month.

In the remote context First Nations media is the most reliable radio and media service available to audiences. I'm very pleased to support First Nations Media Australia and their call for appropriate government reform that fairly treats and invests in diverse creators of public interest journalism, including smaller media organisations and community broadcasters. Many First Nations media organisations have built strong social media followings as a forum for community engagement on topics relevant to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander audiences.

First Nations people are avid consumers of social media. In many ways, Facebook is the new bush telegraph. Certainly a lot of my families and kinship groups keep in touch through Messenger and group chats, with relatives from all over the country joining in, having a laugh and keeping in touch about all sorts of things, even as to whether the flood levels are up and rivers are impassable.

It's wonderful, because, when I'm here doing work in the Senate in Canberra, I can still be in touch with what's going on in Borroloola, Ngukurr, Numbulwar and Urapunga, but it is a double-edged sword, because we know social media can be a prime vehicle for spreading untruths and misinformation. It is especially worrying at this time when we're about to start a mass vaccination campaign in the fight against COVID-19. First Nations communities are among those at the head of the queue to receive the vaccine, and we must make sure First Nations community broadcasters maintain their social media presence and can get out the facts and information to their audiences in the most appropriate way.

At the beginning of this pandemic, First Nations media organisations were at the forefront of getting the information out to communities, keeping them safe and informed. Working with governments and community-controlled health services, the sector used their social media and broadcast channel to spread the word. Whether it was developing jingles in language to promote handwashing, animations that demonstrated the impact of community lockdowns or using local leaders promoting health messages in language, First Nations media literally helped saved lives.

The Chair of First Nations Media Australia, Dot West, said last week, 'Never has our media been more vital than during a global pandemic.' In Dot West's words:

First Nations media services are not the same as commercial outlets and should not be negatively impacted by an industry wide response to corporate interests.

First Nations Media Australia provided input to the development of the proposed mandatory news bargaining code, encouraging flexibility in the legislation to avoid unintended consequences, such as what we're seeing. The financial interests of commercial enterprises should not come at the expense of independent publishers of information vital to community safety and democracy in this country.

The federal government must heed the voice of Dot West and others and the First Nations Media Australia and seek an immediate resolution to its conflict with Facebook and protect the First Nation media industry from further negative impacts. The government must also recognise the importance of First Nations news and journalism by providing support for the production of news content essential to First Nations communities. We must have appropriate government reform that fairly treats and invests in diverse creators of public interest journalism, including smaller media organisations and community broadcasters. I reflect on the Katherine Times and the Centralian Advocate. It is vital that these regional newspapers are supported, but we have seen the demise of many of these across the country. Community broadcasters are vital cogs in our media landscape, producing and broadcasting both hyperlocal and national news for millions of listeners across Australia; creating significant employment, training and career opportunities; and, ultimately, strengthening Australia's democracy by sharing diverse content by diverse and underrepresented voices.

The government contends that one of the reasons for these amendments is to support public interest journalism. I totally agree that it needs to be supported. But that is not happening under this government, which is too busy pandering to the interests of big media business mates to be concerned about what is happening to the broadcasters and journalists who are embedded in our communities and keeping their voices alive when we see so much of our smaller and regional media landscape gutted.