November 20, 2003 – 11:39 pm
There’s a ‘New Future for Public Broadcasting’ conference on in Wellington starting today (yes, I suppose I should really be there) and Steve Maharey has made his comments to start it all off and set the tone.
Here’s what’s interesting: earlier in the year, he started talking about a “Mixed Media Economy”, meaning that public broadcasting would have more of a place in the media landscape than in its post-deregulation decade. The 90s were, let’s face it, all about The Mad Butcher, bee pollen, and sponsored news bulletins. In the past couple of years, the public radio sector has been in recovery.
But now, perhaps to throw Don Brash’s comments promising to further privatise broadcasting into sharp relief, Maharey states:
“I want to be in a position to establish a durable framework for the future – a framework within which the principles of public service broadcasting, in its broadest sense, have a central place. ”
A central place. Wow! There’ll be some happy campers at RNZ today.