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Report: Govt intervenes to stop SKY News running Australia Network

Update: A report claims the government has intervened to stop SKY News winning Australia Network tender, but Rudd defends the delays.

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Fairfax newspapers have today broken a major story that claims the Gillard government has intervened in the tender process for the Australia Network contract to SKY News winning the bid over the ABC.

The ten year contract, worth $223 million, was recently delayed by six months, and shifted from Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd’s portfolio to Communications Minister Senator Stephen Conroy, requesting more information from the ABC and SKY News on their capacity to provide coverage in Africa and the Middle East.

The Sydney Morning Herald reports that an independent panel viewed SKY as the better bidder. Until now the overseas network has been operated by the ABC.

SKY News is believed to have proposed setting up a dedicated channel for China to run separately from the rest of the network as a way of expanding Australia’s reach. The Pay TV operation already has broadcasting deals in place with China’s CCTV and Shanghai Media Group.

Recently SKY News axed News presenter John Mangos, after inappropriate comments about a Chinese lottery winner.

UPDATE: Mr Rudd told ABC Radio today that events in the Middle East had forced a rethink of the tender process.

“If at the end of last year we could all predict that the Middle East would be turned upside down and that we as Australia would face a rolling set of consular crises in the Middle East and therefore the ability to contact thousands of Australians in a range of Middle Eastern countries, then of course we would have framed the guidelines a little more differently.”

16 Responses

  2. The Australian’s Mark Day said one rumour suggested Conroy’s Communications Department were the only ones wanting ABC to keep Australia Network while DFAT, Finance & Treasury all want Sky News to get it – all these departments have oversight on the contract. Yet, I’ll take that with a grain of salt as Day writes for Limited News.

    I’ve stated it before, but the only reason why the Gillard Government would award Australia Network to Sky News is to get Rupert’s ‘hate media’ off their backs. No other reason! If Sky get their dirty hands on it, it’s a short-term domestic political fix for a long-term international contract.

  3. @Dean
    We already have three national broadcasters of which both the ABC and SBS provide quality news coverage. If Sky wants to improve its coverage, it should do it with its own money. The poor production values on Sky, I would suggest are more to do with their own priorities in returning a larger profit to their owners and in creating numerous ‘multiview’ services that add nothing of value to their service. The government should not be subsidising commercial broadcasters.

  4. @James
    Yes I do. The ABC has a monopoly on quality news coverage in Australia and it is high time that this changed. Sky has proven itself to deliver quality political coverage and I think it would be great if they had the money to be able to expand their scope – some people, myself included but not everyone do not like the ABC’s approach and I would love to see Sky challenge.

  5. It should never have gone out to tender in the first place. The idea of a private company running our official voice to the world is patently ridiculous.

  6. @Dean
    “an alternative to the ABC”
    How is this the case? Sky is a privately-owned pay TV service. Do you seriously believe that the government subsidising Sky would be a good thing?

  7. I bet Gina and Rupert go insane over this decision.Abbott will be fighting for his mentor , Murdoch ,and do everything he can to reverse this decision

  8. Question- Would Sky be on the same satellites/transponders as AN is now? Or would it mean tens of thousands of people in the Asia-Pacific region having to replace/realign their TVROs, receivers, etc. if there were a change in satellites?

  9. @James
    Do you really think that sky has that much money now? The reason their production values are not great is because they have no money – if sky wins the contract then we will finally have an alternative to ABC

  10. “SKY News is believed to have proposed setting up a dedicated channel for China to run separately from the rest of the network”.
    Interesting. Why would you want to do that? To provide a sanitised and polotically-correct channel to China? Excise any news reports on politicians complaining about China buying up Australian farms etc. etc. ?, human rights violations, for example.
    Would Sky maintain the Australian drama series aired on AN? City Homicide, Home and Away, Love Patrol, McLeod’s Daughters, Packed to the Rafters, Rescue Special Operations, Rush, Sea Patrol, Spirited, Tangle (etc.) ?

  11. @RoD- I’m thinking if you were watching the AFL as I do then there were half-hour news bulletins between two games at 5:30pm and after the game at 8:30pm (China Time).
    There were further half-hours the next morning at 7:30am, 9:30am, 11:30am plus 3-hrs of ABC Breakfast 4-7am.

  12. SKY is apparently part of the ‘hate media’ so Gillard will do anything to stop it getting a government contract. Plus, Kevin picked it as the winner so obviously she had to change that decision.

  13. Seeing Sky’s low production values in Australia, I can only imagine that both services it would run to Asia and the Pacific would be of an even lower quality given the limited $20 million budget (this, remember, needs to cover a specialised news service, some programmes that focus on the region, content, satellite transmission, marketing, etc.)

  14. The leader of our country – Rupert Murdoch – will not be happy with this!

    No doubt Tony Abbort will use Question Time to attack Julia for stopping his boss Rupert from taking over more of the world’s media?

  15. I was in China last month and was subjected to the Australia Network as the only potential source of news on home. It is useless. Apart from a telecast of an AFL game – there was nothing uptodate or informative (and this was the week the first ash cloud grounded planes – so I needed news from home). Most of it was pseudo-tourism documentaries that had dated badly.
    SKY could only be an improvement – esp. if they are considering a dedicated China service.

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