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FoI knock back on govt’s $30m sports fund

Questions asked over the $30m Federal Budget plan for niche & women’s sport on Pay TV.

ABC Radio has been digging into the government’s plan to devote $30m in niche and women’s sports on Foxtel, announced as part of this year’s Federal Budget.

But Jon Faine’s ABC 774 Mornings program was knocked back in its Freedom of Information application because the communications department says documents do not exist.

It raises questions about whether the pledge was part of a “sweetener” deal to the News Corp / Telstra-owned Pay TV provider at a time when Free to Air networks were given a $127m licence fee relief.

In May Labor Senator Anthony Chisholm asked why the money was not given to free-to-air broadcasters, given the aim was to increase the reach of such sports.

“Will you review this, what is a disgraceful decision, to enable more Australians to see these niche and women’s sports?” Senator Chisholm asked.

Shareholder activist and journalist Stephen Mayne suggested the Government didn’t want to have an enemy in the Murdochs.

“So they just gave them $30 million and then had to come up with a reason, so they’ve come up with this particular reason,” he said.

The Legal Director for the Department of Communications and the Arts “refuse(d) access to the requested documents under subsection 24A(1) of the FOI Act, as I am satisfied that documents failing within the scope of your request do not exist”.

Foxtel declined to comment.

Source: New Daily

11 Responses

  1. Professional women’s sports such as football, cricket and AFL has been only a recent marketing strategy for the administrators and Fox Sports. The ABC have shown Netball and other women’s team sports when licensing allowed but as usual if it proved to have ratings potential it moved elsewhere for the better money. Fox Sports appear to be developing more options for women’s sports most likely because it has been belatedly realised that female team sports do have a lot more audience potential than previously acknowledged.

  2. I think everyone forgets that this 30 million will also provide jobs in broadcast and has so many other benefits. As well as bringing much needed attention to lesser publicized woman’s sport.

    The way some media was reporting this today you would think that the government just deposited 30 million of cold hard cash into Rupert’s account.

    1. Nobody is forgetting anything – there is no guarantee that this $30M will be used for anything positive to the community, let alone provide for more jobs – that’s just your rose-tinted assumption. We don’t know what the money will be used for since the govt and the dept have refused to provide any more detail and Foxtel aren’t speaking up.

      If the money is to provide for, say, the increased promotion and broadcast of women’s sports, then that should have been a binding requirement in order to receive the money, and the govt should have publicly announced this.

      1. I think you will find it is in the budget papers: Portfolio Budget Statements 2017–18—Budget Related Paper No. 1.3—Communications and the Arts Portfolio. Page 31 to be exact.

        If the money is used for anything else than that, well then we have a problem. I’m not sure why everyone is so quick to think the the worst of a situation even before it has happened. About time we all start taking a glass half full approach to life.

        1. “Supporting Underrepresented Sports” is pretty vague and no guarantee that it will result in more jobs, which was your specific claim which I still dispute.

          A half-full and a half-empty glass contain the same amount. You’re talking up a glass whose fullness is not currently known.

  3. It’s was to be fair since they gave a large amount of cash back to the FTA networks and failed to reform the Anti-syphoning and ownership rules that News Corp want. Foxtel has suffered a collapse in advertising and fee revenue due to technological shifts too.

    The Government won’t give more to the ABC because they are unhappy with how the ABC used the Government cuts, (which were funded by efficiencies not content cuts), to get rid of staff they didn’t want in restructures. Then have continued to divert money from local content into the website and a large pay rise for the remaining staff in a time of low inflation and stagnant wages across the economy, a process that started long before Turnbull made the cuts.

    The ABC is trying mounting a political campaign to get money for their women’s sport content (some of which is already paid for by the sports for publicity) so that…

    1. What rubbish. Maybe you don’t care about $30M of taxpayer money being given to a private company, apparently with no strings attached, but the public have a right to know how their money is being spent.

      It beggars belief that the DCA claims that there are no documents regarding this transaction

      1. Yeah well, I’ve spoken to people in the ABC and they’ve told me that. So it’s not rubbish actually.

        You can have your view on the money and documents, but don’t be so naive about the ABC.

        1. Obviously, your sources are without question. Have you also spoken to people at Women Sport Australia and Screen Australia as they also have concerns regarding the lack of transparency and documentation over a $30M gift of taxpayer funds to a commercial enterprise.

          It is disingenuous try to paint this as simply sour grapes on behalf of the ABC.

  4. Very large pot to very small kettle? This is an organisation getting one thousand million dollars from taxpayers and they want to know about 30 million?

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