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Xenophon accepts SBS petition against increased ads

Independent Senator will table a petition of more than 60,000 signatures in Parliament.

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A petition of over 60,000 signatures objecting to SBS increasing primetime advertising was unveiled in Canberra yesterday.

Independent Senator Nick Xenaphon, who was joined by Margaret Pomeranz, Quentin Dempster and Save our SBS spokesperson Steve Aujard, will table the petition in Parliament.

The petition objects to SBS increasing primetime ads from 5 to 10 minutes in a bid to make up a government funding shortfall.

“This is actually about protecting a public broadcaster that has done very well over the years in terms of its content and its impact on the Australian society for the better,” Xenaphon said.

“If you go down this path there (is) nothing to stop future governments saying … ‘you’re going to get more money from commercial revenue, from advertising revenue; we’re going to cut your budget further’.

“Putting advertising on it, or increased levels of advertising, is, I think, quite destructive of its charter obligations.”

Labor and the Greens also oppose the move.

SBS Managing Director Michael Ebeid has previously noted, “…should this legislation pass Parliament, SBS would only implement additional advertising in programs and timeslots where the advertising return could genuinely aid our ability to invest in Australian content.”

Senator Xenophon said he would fight to restore funding to SBS and help the Government find other savings.

Source: ABC

3 Responses

  1. Everything about this infuriates me. Xenophon has absolutely no hope of getting more funding to SBS but he will actively stand in the way of a really simple bit of legislation that will allow the corporation to make the most of what it has. Pomeranz should know better too. I get that she thinks she’s being everyone’s favourite cool public broadcaster but the reality is that when SBS can’t get this legislation through, a bunch of programmes & people will actually just have to go. She will have directly contributed to hobbling the broadcaster. And she’s been told numerous times by SBS employees that this is the case. However it seems grandstanding comes first. It’s one thing for the Liberal government to make cuts to the two public broadcasters. You expect that. It’s what they do. It’s a whole other thing when lefty types shove a spear in from the other end.

  2. I think we should just sell of abc and maybe sbs, but if they think more ads in needed then go ahead don’t listen to silly people, I’m sure if they don’t do it sbs might have to shut down, govs shouldn’t own any tv unless it’s different cultures news

    1. Perhaps SBS and ABC should sell subscriptions(voluntary, of course! we don’t want licence fees reinstated by stealth). SBS should never have been running ads in the first place as they operate under the same category of licence as the ABC, Category A = National(I don’t use the word ‘Class’ because that word implies a quality often absent from many of the programmes on SBS lately). Subscriptions could be annual but no more than $25 per annum and subscribers receive a monthly hard-copy(not internet download) book detailing programming over any given month, much in the same fashion as community radio funded itself in the earlier days of that medium.

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