Rex Patrick (SA, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

In the development of this legislation, the government were very clear in saying that this wasn't about news getting particular deals. However, it ends up that that's the effect of it. The root of this comes from the ACCC's recommendation dealing with what is effectively a monopoly, an imbalance in power. If a very large company does not become designated, we still end up with a proposition that the smaller, typically, country or niche media organisations are left in the very same situation that the ACCC warned against and was trying to remedy. Again, I'm very troubled by this provision and how it will affect the implementation of what the ACCC has raised as a concern. Does this not undermine the ACCC's desire to deal with huge imbalances between a small player and a large player because the Treasurer has found that in a number of different cases a deal has been done? However, it doesn't resolve the power imbalance for perhaps a smaller player that we want to have fostered amongst our journalist community.