One of Tasmania’s two commercial television news bulletins will be presented out of Wollongong, NSW, according to local media reports.
WIN news will no longer be presented from Hobart, but instead moved to the regional television company’s headquarters from August 17, and local weekend bulletins will be scrapped entirely.
WIN hasn’t formally announced the decision, and didn’t respond to Crikey’s request for comment this morning. Network CEO Andrew Lancaster said in a statement that it was just “industry standard”.
“Whilst the presentation location of our weeknightly WIN News is changing, WIN’s newsrooms in Tasmania will continue to provide the stories of interest to Tasmanian viewers as well as WIN News updates as normal throughout the day on weekdays,” Lancaster said. “Technology allows us to present the news from a central location which creates a more efficient way to deliver that news. In this case it means utilising existing facilities.”
Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance Tasmania president Mark Thomas told Crikey that staff were “shattered” by the decision. “They’ve worked very hard over the last couple of years to produce a good local bulletin,” he said. Thomas said that while staff have been told no journalists or camera crew would lose their jobs, the network would be produced fewer bulletins with more staff in the newsroom (with presenters back in the pool of reporters).
“WIN TV, and before it Tas TV, has an almost 60 years history in producing local news in Tasmania, and that will now be produced out of Wollongong,” he said. “It’s about that connection — the local news and sports readers are plastered all over the Metro buses, these are local personalities who people look out for.”
Thomas said that fewer local media options was bad for the community. “What’s most disappointing is any loss of local content is … also bad for young journalists and young people. Tasmania is still a hot bed for young journalists, people end up here, they start their careers here, and this is a pathway that will be lost.”
The move is a sign of increasing financial pressure on regional media.
WIN’s commercial TV news competitor in Tasmania, Southern Cross, had an embarrassing spat with Seven after it announced it was rebranding its news bulletins to “Seven News Tasmania”, only to backtrack and remain Southern Cross. Media Watch reported that the turnaround came after Seven told the regional affiliate they didn’t want their name on something they didn’t have control over.
And just this week, Media Watch reported that WIN’s Queensland and Canberra bulletins had been directed to run a “newsworthy” story, created by a production company for Australia Post about stamp collecting month.
The cost-cutting move echoes a similar decision by Nine last year to present and produce the Northern Territory’s only commercial TV bulletin from Queensland.
WIN’s move to program news produced by Sky News 24 hours a day on one of its digital channels is another cost saving move. WIN currently has an expensive affiliation agreement with Ten Network. By broadcasting Sky News, WIN will be able to cut costs in its next affiliation agreement with Ten by not taking as programming from that network and replacing one of its regular digital channels with Sky News.
WIN owner Bruce Gordon has warmly greeted the planned bid by Nine for Fairfax Media. He owns around 19% of Nine and even though that will be watered down by the shares and cash offer, he figures his Nine stake will be worth more because of the offer. That’s despite his falling out with Nine over their affiliation agreement, which forced him to sign up with Ten when Nine snapped up Ten’s affiliate, Southern Cross.
Hobart’s WIN newsroom moved into the ABC’s building in 2014, and still leases the first floor of the building, but there is no content-sharing deal between the two organisations.
An economical move is important if you want to win.
It’s Win-wan isn’t it?
Is the digital platform good for the media and good for Australians? We hear adnauseum that we must follow the future and follow digital. And what do we get from following digital, the media will be wrecked and dismantled because of the concentration and less diversity and the squeeze will close down some aspects of news.
To follow digital it is economically tightening and tightening the noose. The more the media follows it the less money they make and the less audiences that follow down that path. Sounds like madness to me. At the end of the destructive image, all we will have is the Australian masses watching second-rate news broadcasts from about five different TV networks. They then without competition will interleave the news with advertising until adversting is more important than the news. And we will have less intelligent and a less informed community.
George Orwell’s image of the future is coming towards us.
This should be a wake-up to the everlasting complainers in the government about the ABC. With one commercial network closing local news in Tasmania, and the imminent closure of two Fairfax newspapers in the north and north-west of the state this leaves a very small diversity of media. If they get their way and privatise the ABC there will be virtually no local news. What happens then in the event of natural disasters – bushfires, floods, etc. I do not think voters will be happy with a government which lets this happen.
And who are the everlasting complainers in the government. You mean “The Government” as all the government complain about the ABC as they all jump to what the leader says.