SCATHING ATTACK ON BROADCASTING CONTROL IN N.Z.

Wanganui Chronicle, 5 October 1946, Page 7

SCATHING ATTACK ON BROADCASTING CONTROL IN N.Z.

BOOKMAKERS ALLEGEDLY ARE SOLE SOURCE OF RACING INFORMATION

A scathing’ attack on the system of Government control of broadcasting in Nev.' Zealand over the last ten years is made by Mr. A. F. O’Donoghue, of Auckland, in a booklet entitled “The. Rise and Fall of Radio Broadcasting in Now Zealand.” Mr. O’Donoghue was associated with broadcasting for .17 years from the formation of the Radio Broadcasting Company in 1925 and covering the period of administration by the Broadcasting Board from 1932-35, followed by complete State control of the service from 1935 onwards.

the company ami the board were immeasurably superior to those which have existed since under political control.

Among the allegations made by Mr. O’Donognue are the following:— The Director of Broadcasting (Professor J. Shelley) neither directs nor manages the service; this is done by the Minister.

No overseas talent, apart from a small group brought here for the Centennial, has been engaged for broadcasting purposes since the Labour Party came to power.

The service is used to broadcast serials constituting never - ending courses of crime education, with disturbing effects on the extent of juvenile delinquency. There has been a gradual falling-off in the quality of concert and entertainment service.

The Government has refused to engage at Auckland, Christchurch and Dunedin, for broadcasting in those centres, any person or group versed in dramatic art.

In the vast majority of cases broadcasting talent is paid the same fees as 10 years agv. Indiscriminate and shameful use of radio broadcasting for Labour Party propaganda has completely overwhelmed the service and has reduced it, from the entertainment point •’ view, to “the merest sounding of brass and tinkling of cymbal.”

Bookmakers are the sole medium and official source through which race results are supplied to all broadcasting stations. Since Government control not one employee has been dismissed through lack of efficiency. Artists’ fees are unpaid from two to four weeks, and trading firms' accounts have been unsettled for six months or more. Inefficiency and muddlement at the administration office exist among the cash and account dealing “where chaos ever reigns.” APPOINTMENT OF DIRECTOR. When the Government took control of broadcasting, says Mr. O’Donoghue, Mr. Savage sought an officer who was politically sound and a Rationalist. He approached Mr. Henry Hayward, president of the Rationalists’ Association and Sunday Freedom League, offering him the position, but Mr. Hayward declined. The position was then offered to and accepted by Professor Shelley, vice-president of the Rationalist Association, at a salary of £ISOO rising to £2OOO. “Professor Shelley soon realised he was not director of broadcasting at all. He is merely an animated pawn on a political chessboard to be moved and pushed at the beck and call r.f the Government; he is limited in every direction; his mighty future plans are on the shelf; his advice is not sought and, when given, is unacceptable,” writes Mr. O’Donoghue. Dealing with successive Ministers of Broadcasting he writes: “He has always been of t he backward

type and never capable of judgng values nor assessing the remunerative equivalent of the goods delivered by a great artist. . . .

“The Director of Broadcasting cannot engage a high-grade overseas artist without the consent of a Minister who is not capable of judging the quality of work, but merely asks ‘What is the fee?’ and, if he considers the price too high, there is no engagement. Once more art is measured by the ton.”

Mr. O’Donoghue denounces the Government for imposing “indignity and humiliation” on artists, whose fees, with tax deducted, often amount to only 18s 4d for one performance. On t 1.3 other hand on March 31, 1945, a huge surplus of £1,570,000 from listeners’ fees had accumulated, supplimented by an annual income of £435,000. The Musicians’ Union had, after much pressure, extracted a promise from the Minister to establish a permanent orchestra in election year.

“PASS THE BUCK.”

The au-thor alleges that the Government, if called to account to justify actions which arouse public criticism, such as the banning of a broadcast of a public meeting held in Auckland in 1943 to discuss an outbreak of imr .ality in the city, attempts to “pass the buck” to lesser officials through the director. He also describes Mr. Fraser's action in broadcasting the shooting of Japanese prisoners in tnc Dominion following a riot during the war as a "tragic blunder.”

Other points of criticism cited by the author can be briefly stated as follows: The association of the Public Service Commissio'ner with the broadcasting service is “utterly hopeless and unworkable”; the Government overruled Mr. Shelley’s decision and granted part-time orchestral players two weeks’ annual leave on full pay when they were already entitled to* two weeks from their regular employers—“a sorry example of squandering listeners’ money for political purposes”; a technician was appointed acting station manager at Auckland, one necessarily untrained in studio practice and management and programme presentation. After discussing the conduct of the Commercial Broadcasting Service, Mr. O'Donoghue suggests that listeners subscriptions should he held as a separate fund and controlled and administered by a people's executive or council and not by the Government. Such a plan, he says, would free the Government of all obligations to grant favours to political supporters and relieve it of the temptation to use the broadcasting service, as it does the Legislative Council, for compensating designing and troublesome party adherents. who are ever making demands in return for services rendered.

BENEFIT TO BOOKMAKERS I Ln alleging official acceptance of ! the services of an illegal bookmakers’ organisation to supply race results for announcement by the National Broadcasting Service, Mr. O'Donoghue claims that it has been the bookmakers’ object to enhance their business by having results of every racing event in the Dominion broadcast by all stations as soon as the horses passed the post.

After referring to his experience of the resource and alertness of the bookmakers in taking advantage of all methods of communication. Mr. O’Donoghue says that even in the early days of broadcasting, when the service was run by a company, and later during the administration of the Broadcasting Board, bookmakers telephoned the radio station with the results of races in other centres. These would be noted unofficially and used at 3.30 in the afternoon when sports results were announced. “But the bookmaker was then never recognised by the management,” Mr. O'Donoghue states. “He was unknown to the members of the staff and was regarded as some useful intruder who tinkled on the telephone and gave the results of a race. On Friday he would post to our address his ‘card of the races' so that we would have no difficulty in ticking off the placed horses when the telephone spoke. All this effort, so far as we were concerned, was unsolicited, unofficial and unrewarded.”

Mr. O'Donoghue says that at this time the only authorised and official manner of distributing the race results to the broadcasting stations was for the station managers to telegraph all stations with the results of meetings held in their particular centres. However, some time after the service was taken over by the Government a letter was addressed to all station managers reading something like: “As all stations now have their own source of supply for race results, it will not be necessary in future for managel's to telegraph the results of race meetings held in their respective districts to other stations.” “We had sold out to the bookmaker,” Mr. O’Donoghue claims. “He had now been appointed official representative of the National Broadcasting Service. He was the sole medium and official source through which race results were to be supplied to all broadcasting stations, national and commercial, throughout New Zealand.” TESTED THEIR STRENGTH

The letter from the head office of the service left no doubt in the mind of the station manager about what and where the source of supply was. However, to test the strength of the grip obtained by the bookmakers over the service, Mr. O’Donoghue says he issued instructions one afternoon to the effect that the scratchings at the Timaru meeting that day were not to be broadcast, and then waited for the reaction.

Soon the telephones began to ring. Guessersj punters, welchers and bookmakers all clamoured to know the reason for this omission. The bookmaker was furious because his clients were not getting a fair spin, for it was impossible without knowledge of the scratchings for money to flow freely.

! That evening the chief distributing officer at the bookmakers’ headquarters rang the stations sports announcer and warned him that he must reason with Mr. O'Donoghue and bring him to his senses. He added an ultimatum that unless an undertaking were given that the scratchings at the next meeting would be broadcast he would refuse to supply the station with any information whatsoever.

Mr. O'Donoghue adds that the volume of business handled by the illegal bookmaking organisation was amazing. With seven or eight race meetings held in different parts of New Zealand on the same day they had no difficulty in letting the radio station have the results from all the courses shortly after the horses passed the post. This suggested the closest co-operation of the Post and Telegraph Department.

(A report of a debate on broadcastcasting, in the House of Representatives yesterday, in which Mr. O'Donoghue’s book is mentioned, appears on page 5.)