A BETTER SERVICE WANTED

Dominion, Volume 20, Issue 60, 4 December 1926, Page 15

A BETTER SERVICE WANTED

RADIO PROGRAMMES IN NEW ZEALAND TRADE DEPUTATION TO P. AND T. SECRETARY NEW WELLINGTON STATION IN SIX MONTHS

Complaint regarding the present position of broadcasting in New Zealand was made by a deputation which waited upon the Secretary ot the lost and Telegraph Department (Air. G. iucNamara) this week. An official repoit of the interview has been supplied tor publication, as under:— Air Fleming said that he desired that it be' clearly understood that those present represented a section of the New Zealand Electrical Federation, and were speaking on behalf of the dealers throughout the Dominion. Their ob« ject in placing certain facts before the authorities was for the , sole purpose of endeavouring to obtain a general betterment of conditions with regard to broadcasting. He requested the Secre. tary- to permit a statement from the radio experts present. Mr. Wyles stated it would be recognised that good stations and bad programmes, or good programmes and bad stations, were both detrimental to g 6 ® 6l- - al broadcasting. New Zealand had at present two good stations erected by a recognised firm of experts under the supervision of a first-class engineer. Since the Broadcasting Company had taken over the running of the stations the technical efficiency had decreased, particularly in the case of Christchurch station. It was considered that a man of technical consequence should be eniployed by the company to maintain the existing stations at their proper efficiency and to carry out the installation of the new stations to be erected at Wellington and Dunedin. A precedent in this direction had been set by the appointment of Mr. J. M. Prentice to the position of programme organiser and general supervisor, and great things were expected of his efforts. A trained technical man would put the same professional finish on the transmissions as Mr. Prentice would cer-' tainly put on the programme side.

Mutual Interests Involved. "In broadcasting,” said Mr. Wyles, "all parties concerned have mutual interests, as success benefits the Broadcasting Company with increased revenue, the Government with increased licenses, the trade with sales, and the public with satisfaction and more inducement to install better apparatus. It is considered that the crux of the matter lies in the necessity for the furnishing of better programmes, and it la hard to understand why the company states it cannot put on better artists because of lack of funds. If a man goes into business and informs the public that the cheap articles he is selling will Iks stocked until they purchase them so as to give him additional money to stock better articles, then that man is not going to do business. This, in effect, is what the Broadcasting Company is offertug at present. They state they cannot put on better programmes. until more licenses are issued. The opinion of the trade is that there are thousands of discriminating people who are not prepared to buy sets until the programmes are considerably improved. The fact that licenses-have increased wonderfully since August and that the company _is in receipt of numbers of appreciative letters is quite natural because there is a market at present for people who are prepared to install wireless because of its novelty. The present policy will only carry the company up to the receipt of a. certain revnue and then no progress will be made, until high grade programmes are substituted and the four stations are in operation. Unquestionably, there is a lot of pirating, but New Zealand is no more dishonest than other parts of the world where broadcasting wits established from the outset with up-to-date stations of good power and first-class programmes In all parts of the world where the licensing system is in operation the stations are either clearing expenses or making a profit. If the company is not prepared to put the service in properly from the start and risk their capital they should not have accepted, or been given, the contract.

“Illogical Plea.” “The first thing the company should do is to pay its artists and pay them reasonably/* be continued. ‘*lt is understood that the Auckland station is paying its artiste at the rate of 10s. 6d. per programme and that elsewhere in the Dominion artists give their services voluntarily. Services given by volunteer artists never will be satisfactory and professionals who give their sei vices for 10s. 6d. per night will not give programmes satisfactory to discriminating listeners-in. Artists are paid at least 30s. per night by the Australian stations; many receive four and hve guineas, and some as high as ten guineas and over, according to their standing. Rehearsals are compulsory, lhe Broadcasting Company has a capital of A-U.OOO, and it is understood that only £4OOO of this has been called up, so that the installations of the existing .stations and the carrying on of the service is met by license tees. Io plead P 0 therefore, does not seem logical. Iha existing stations at Wellington and Dunedin are unsatisfactory, and the new stations should .be built immediately, and due notice given to the trade of the date of their opening to enable adequate stocks to be available to meet the demand for sets which invariably follows the opening of a new station. In this connection it was pointed out from the commencement that there was an atmosphere of suspicion due to , Ul ® very indefinite information granted to the trade and the public Since its inception the company has been criticised because of its lack of frankness. It is not expected that the company its private business, but as a public company controlling a public service, it is responsible to the Postmaster-General and therefore to the, public, and it should make available all matters of general interest and. in, particular, its proposals for the future.

Question of Wave Lengths. Mr. Smail outlined his experience in connection with the original Broadcasting Company, and stressed the “ a higher class of programme. He stated that from information received, it was understood that a conference would be held in Australia early next year with reference to the re-a location of war* lengths. It was the desire of the trade that New Zealand should participate, ami he had been instructed to request the Secretary to endeavour to persuade the Government to take up the matter of representation with the Australian authorities. 1

Need for Better Service Realised. Mr McNamara expressed pleasure in receiving the deputation, and said he could at once assure those present that every effort would be made, in so far as broadcasting was concernel, to bring the position to a satisfactory conclusion. The Post and Telegraph Department usually was regarded as efficient, and every effort would be made to provide a wireless service of which the general public would be prowl. He would point out that rightly or wronglv an endeavour was being made by certain writers in the daily Press to force the company into an awkward nosition. The critiesm that was being levelled was entirely destructive, and did not tend to assist either the Government the company, or the nubile During the first year the net loss to 'he company had been approximately £lOOO, and since then they had lost between £3OO and £5OO per month. In his opinion the company had made every reasonable effort to give a satis factory service, but whilst pirating continued on its present scale, it would bo

Impossible for the company to progress as it should. Unfortunately, it appeared that the average listener-in had no sympathy with the company who, under present conditions, could not afford to render a better service. It bad. in fact, reached the stage when a further immediate expenditure to improve programmes was almost out of the question. Unfortunately, the Department could not give a guarantee that pirating would be effectively stopped, and it could not be expected that the company should make further expenditure of capital until a reasonable return was in sight.

The Department realised that a better sei vice was necessary, and, in this connection, it had called upon the company to proceed with the erection of the AVellington station forthwith, and listeners-in could took forward to having a good station at Wellington in about six months’ time. He would draw the company’s attention to the technical faults mentioned, and no doubt a remedy would be found. Ten Thousand Licenses. On August 1 last, Mr. McNamara explained, there were approximately WOO licensed listeners-in, from whom revenue of nearly .4:4400 was forthcoming. Ho was pleased to sa.y that this figure had considerably increased, until at the present moment over 10,000 listeners-in were licensed. It was estimated that at least 32,000 licenses would be issued, and no doubt when this figure was within sight, programmes suitable to the demands of all sections could be guaranteed. Whilst admitting that the Department was not enforcing the full conditions of tho contract with the company, it was at the same time requiring at least an adequate return for the money invested. It must not be overlooked that the income was small; when every listener-in regarded it as a duty to pay his fees, much more could be provided. AA’ith reference to the Australian conference, the deputation would realise that the matter was one of policy, and would be duly represented to the Government. He assured the deputation that the matter was receiving full consideration, and he requested further that the trade should give full co-operation both to the Department and the company.