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Govt to consider SBS relocation

"Labor has committed to commissioning a feasibility study into the relocation of the SBS headquarters," says Michelle Rowland.

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SBS could relocate from Artarmon to Western Sydney under a proposal to be considered by the new Labor government.

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland told The Sunday Telegraph a proposal will soon go to cabinet.

“Labor has committed to commissioning a feasibility study into the relocation of the SBS headquarters and studios from Artarmon to Western Sydney, alongside the provision of a multipurpose space for community use,” she said.

“These proposals are now being developed to go to Cabinet in due course and more information about the timing of the feasibility study will be provided to relevant stakeholders when it is available later this year.”

Last year Canterbury-Bankstown Council sought to lure SBS to a new cultural hub called SBS Square, as part of a bigger vision, Connective City 2036.

The council said the cost of building SBS Square with a new SBS HQ would be in the vicinity of $120 million, create almost 400 construction jobs and generate $85m for the Sydney economy. Former premier and federal foreign minister Bob Carr and Canterbury-Bankstown Mayor Khal Asfour said the sale of Artarmon site would net some $70m to offset costs.

That report was presented to Communications Minister Paul Fletcher in mid 2021.

11 Responses

  1. It’s mostly about the ALP shoring up their vote in the area by providing jobs. Skilled professionals do tend to live close to were they work, because they can afford to pay the property prices for a short commute. The ABC collected a lot of start who live around Ultimo over the decades, and became quite cliquey. Ita has deliberately tried to decentralise it. The problem with decentralisation is that skilled workers can easily go and work for your competition. Only the less skilled are forced to move out to the suburbs or region, resulting in the organisation becoming deskilled and less productive. Most commercial decentralisations e.g. AMP, GIO, The Commonwealth Bank moves to Parramatta failed and were reversed. The service industry is all about staff and it is easier to recruit and hold skilled staff in the CBD and major hubs.

    1. … well when it comes to the ABC, radio was all over Sydney from Elizabeth Street to Kings Cross before Ultimo was built … television used to be on the north shore at Gore Hill, the film drama unit at Frenchs Forest and the training studio at Kings Cross … in fact there was a concerted effort by staff and unions to stop the move of television to Ultimo because nobody lived near there !!!

  2. Sick of hearing the ‘D’-word. Surely it’s program content that matters, not the residents. Anyway, News won’t have so far to travel to cover the daily drive-by shootings if they move to the western Sydney region, despite the unwarranted waste of money.

  3. ABC could also be moved to Western Sydney as well to reflect more mainstream Australia instead of inner-city Australia. The Ultimo site would be worth quite a lot of money.

    1. Relocation costs would be astronomic for no justifiable reason-and the ABC staff aren’t recruited from whatever post code the studio is located!

      1. Is it justifiable to relocate SBS? I think a reason might have been because Western Sydney is said to be more diverse, yet Artarmon statistically is already very diverse, including over 50% of residents born overseas.

    2. I think the ABC’s reach across TV, Radio, Digital etc would demonstrate that it already reflects mainstream Australia much more than any other media outlet. How would spending millions of dollars creating a new building change that? Plus what about all their other offices in the capital cities and regional centres? Should they all move to Western Sydney?

      1. er … ABC has already announced that they are moving hundreds of staff to Western Sydney … and as for “all their other offices in the capital cities and regional centres”, there’s hardly anyone left !!!

  4. ‘Create 400 new construction jobs’ actually translates to ‘add more to labour shortages that will cause delays and cost blow outs to an already heated construction market’-a bad and unneeded project’.

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