Dean Smith (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is with pleasure that I rise today to make this contribution and in so doing note an anniversary that I think all sides of politics, and indeed all Australians, can join together to celebrate as a significant national milestone. On 3 December1945, at 12.15 pm, ABC Radio in Sydney began an Australian rural tradition with the following announcement:

Hello, everyone. This is Dick Snedden of the Country Hour with a program for the farm families of Australia.

From that day, for one hour every weekday, the ABC's Country Hour has reflected the changing fortunes of our rural industries and communities. It is officially recognised by the Guinness Book of Records as being Australia's longest running radio program.

In its inception, the program was actually intended as a source of advice, an information service for returned soldiers who had taken up soldier settlement farms immediately following the end of the Second World War, but who had no or little idea about the practicalities of how to farm. Early on, the program was only broadcast from Sydney; however, after a couple of years, correspondents were also appointed in other capital cities, providing state market and weather information and contributing stories to the nationwide Country Hour. Later, the Country Hour became a separate weekday specialist program in each of Australia's states.

One of the early features of the program was a radio serial called The Lawsons, its plot lines giving listeners an incentive to tune in each day. In 1949, this was replaced by the serial Blue Hills, which continued to run until September 1976 and which is now fondly recalled by many as the definitive Australian radio serial. However, it was the Country Hour's coverage of news stories and issues of local relevance to the ABC's rural audience that have made the program the broadcasting institution it is today. From stories of bumper wheat harvests, high cattle prices and the mining boom to the devastating impact of floods, droughts, fires and cyclones, for 70 years the Country Hour has shared the very best and the very worst of rural life with its listeners, causing much needed debate, and even a few arguments in the homesteads, in the paddocks, the saleyards and even a few corporate boardrooms.

In Western Australia, its importance cannot be underestimated, for since its launch it has been instrumental in getting the rather conservative farming community to accept progressive ideas. Unlike other rural or regional programs, the Country Hour has focused, not on the current affairs side of regional life, but on the issues and events impacting on WA's rural communities: the opening of the Ord River Irrigation project in the 1960s; the collapse of the wool reserve price scheme in the 1990s; the deregulation of the Western Australian wheat industry; the introduction of GM crops; the impact of wild dog attacks; the suspension of live cattle exports to Indonesia. These are just some of the numerous issues that the Country Hour has brought forward to the listeners in my home state of Western Australia. In addition to its stories, the Country Hour also provides a necessary service to its rural listeners, providing up-to-date weather reports, information on harvest bans and bushfire or cyclone warnings.

It is also one of the strongest leaders in online journalism and has successfully expanded beyond the boundaries of traditional radio, into such areas as social media and video production. This is why the ABC's Country Hour has become one of the best training grounds for today's up-and-coming journalists, with hundreds applying each year for a coveted position as a reporter with the program and the chance to bring stories from smaller rural communities to a wider audience.

In Western Australia, the Country Hour Team, headed by Executive Producer Richard Hudson and presenter Belinda Varischetti, has become one of the most dominant leaders in rural journalism, recently winning the Rural Media Association of Western Australia's awards for Best News Coverage Broadcast, Best Media Feature, Best New Entrant, Best Photograph; and Best Online Coverage.

Of course, the ABC is sometimes a subject of discussion and debate in this place, and I think that is proper. I think we should always be discussing ways that our nation's national public broadcaster can evolve. As chair of the government's backbench committee on communications, it is a discussion I have had frequently with my colleagues and, indeed, on occasion with those in senior management positions at the ABC. However, I have also expressed to them—and I think this is something that all senators in this place would agree with—my wholehearted admiration for the work the ABC does in regional communities across Australia, most particularly in my own state of Western Australia.

As I have noted in previous contributions in this place, it can be difficult for those living in some of Australia's major urban centres to properly appreciate just how important the local ABC radio station is to those living in many of our rural communities. It is not just the local radio station. In areas where there is limited choice of media outlets, it is also a vital hub in times of emergency or just in those challenging times that are all too frequently visited upon those living in regional communities as a result of things such as drought or a fall in commodity prices that pushes farm incomes down.

As patron senator for Durack, which is Australia's largest and most isolated regional electorate, and as chair of the communications backbench committee of this government, I recognise the importance of regional broadcasters and the challenges they face, especially in the rapidly evolving media landscape. We now live and work in the era of high-speed broadband, mobile technology and the 24-hour news cycle. More than that, the entry of players such as Netflix, Spotify and Apple TV to the market mean that consumers increasingly are able to simply pick the content they wish to view or listen to. Particularly for younger Australians, the concept of broadcasting is no longer always relevant. They do not switch on the radio or television and see what is on; rather, today they seek out the content—and only the content—that is of interest to them. The challenge for governments is to deal appropriately with this emerging market reality.

One of the greatest risks facing regional broadcasters is the increase in services from overseas and from capital cities, which has seen the reduction of many regional services and, regrettably, the retrenchment of many working in regional media markets. This inevitably leads to a loss of local flavour in some of Australia's regional communities. This concern applies equally to commercial broadcasters and to the ABC.

I have had reason to question some of the decisions ABC management have made over the past year in relation to resource allocation. We are operating in a constrained fiscal environment. That is just a reality that we all have to accept. Those of us in this place who are prepared to deal with fiscal reality—which, sadly, seems sometimes lacking from those opposite—understand that this means the ABC needed to make some difficult decisions. But I remain concerned that the ABC remains a top-heavy organisation. I am concerned that there are those who see the reduction of the ABC's regional services as the easy option when it comes to reducing the organisation's costs, instead of examining more closely the organisation's operations in some of our larger capital cities. The closure of regional broadcasters and news services only serves to reduce the quality of the news, especially that information that is so unique to those residing in our rural communities.

I do not say this in the sense of looking backwards in some romantic sense to a golden era of radio. This is not a debate about sentimentality. Nor are these arguments solely about advancing the interests of rural and regional communities. As much as anything, there is an economic imperative that drives the need for quality regional broadcasting in Australia. This is because information flow is a two-way thing. The rural sector is incredibly important to Australia's economic performances, especially our growing export markets, which are moving into an exciting phase as a result of the work of this government in securing free trade agreements with South Korea, Japan and China. For that reason, it is vitally important that those living and making decisions in metropolitan parts of our country have an opportunity to find out about the issues that are having a day-to-day impact on rural life. The fact that many people living in our cities may not realise that only serves to underscore this point: it is crucially important that news from rural Australia forms part of the media content that is absorbed by those living in metropolitan areas.

National identity and character is shaped by people having an opportunity to share their unique stories. Just as that is true of Indigenous Australians and of Australians from different cultural backgrounds, so too it is true of Australians living in our regional communities, especially in a country as geographically large as our own, with significant numbers of people living many thousands of kilometres away from their largest major city. The ability of rural Western Australia to participate in the national debate can only continue if programs such as the Country Hour are able to maintain their specific regional focus. So, in congratulating the ABC's Country Hour on achieving the significant milestone of 70 unbroken years on the air, I also take this opportunity to acknowledge the work of all those people working in regional broadcasting and regional media outlets—both public and commercial—and pay tribute to the critical role they continue to play in shaping Australia's rich national story.