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WIN ends WA regional News bulletins

WIN TV will scrap its regional bulletins in WA and close its Broome, Geraldton and Albany bureaus.

WIN TV will scrap its regional bulletins in Western Australia after less than 5 1/2 years and close its Broome, Geraldton and Albany bureaus.

Cutbacks will also be made its remaining Bunbury and Kalgoorlie newsrooms. The Bunbury newsroom will be cut from two to one video journalist, while a video journalist will remain at the Kalgoorlie office.

About 15 staff are expected to be affected by the closures.

Ratings from last week show fewer than 9000 people watched WIN’s bulletins compared with 44,000 people for GWN News.

WIN issued a statement saying it would rely on freelance video journalists to cover its former regional rounds.

Bunbury-based journalist Wade Dobson said via Twitter is was “a sad day for myself and the rest of the WIN News WA crew”.

Colleague Candace Barnes tweeted: “We all did the best we could.”

A new half-hour WIN News bulletin will be on 4:30pm weekdays, hosted by Matt Tinney from the WIN Network’s Perth studios in Dianella. Nine News will be shown across the state at 6pm.

“This bulletin will lay the foundations for long term success and is a major step forward for the development of Nine News in WA,” WIN news director Stewart Richmond said in a statement.

But Australian Journalists’ Association WA president Martin Turner said “My understanding is they get a lot of work and efficiency out of their staff who go above and beyond to get their stories, so it makes you wonder how much more efficient and streamlined these operations can be to deliver their services..

“It’s disappointing for the regions where the bureaus are being closed because they’ve been crying out for local content and information.”

Nine refused to comment on the redundancies.

Source: Yahoo, The Australian

4 Responses

  1. WIN WA is a relatively young service. It’s only been on air since 1999. In the “old days,” (before aggregation) it didn’t exist.

    In SA, WIN has a monopoly in the regional areas where it operates. Like the commercial channels did in the “old days”.

  2. More channels = less localism. Oh for the old days with locally-produced regional programs.
    Judging by WIN/Nine’s Perth news figures they may as well close that down too, if “ratings” was the reason for the regional cuts.

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