N.Z.B.C. channel supported

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33044, 11 October 1972, Page 16

N.Z.B.C. channel supported

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WELLINGTON, October 10.

If New Zealand wanted its second television network to provide a real choice of programme, a single body must be responsible for the two networks, as the N.Z.B.C. proposed, the director of programmes for 8.8. C. television (Mr David Attenborough) said today.

He was appearing as a witness for the N.Z.B.C. in its application to the Broadcasting Authority for a warrant to establish and run a second channel.

He said that judging from the Independent Television Corporation's prospectus, the company would be nothing less than a competing network.

If that was accepted and put into force, then he could see no reason to suppose that it would not produce the same effects that competition had done everywhere else in broadcasting. “That is to say, it will produce more of the same, with a somewhat reduced variety at a considerably higher price.” Of competition with news, he said that protection against some invisible censorship of news by, say, the Government was sometimes said to be essential. But the calibre of people working in television news was such that censorship or bias imposed from outside would produce an outcry from them.

If this danger, though slight, was thought to be worth guarding against, it might be possible to provide a separate news service. However, its independence would depend on a very substantial amount of finance. Two competing organisations would often be bidding against each other when buying programmes and talent, and there would be a major increase in loss. There would have to be an increase in licence fees, or the N.Z.B.C. would often have to settle for second best It semed that the more intense the competition the greater the similarity of programmes. With the 8.8. C. and I.T.V. sport was placed against sport, and documentary against documentary. Competition in New Zealand would be more extreme than in the United Kingdom,

because the N.Z.8.C., unlike the 8.8. C., derived nearly half its income from advertising. The N.Z.B.C. could not allow part of its income to be reduced, and would be compelled to react to competition in an even more extreme way than the 8.8. C. had done. He said close consultation was necessary between two channels to ensure complementary programming.