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Local production at risk without quotas

A report has found that Australian drama and kid's TV would all but disappear if content quota were scrapped.

A report by PricewaterhouseCoopers has found that Australian drama and kid’s TV would all but disappear if content quotas for free-to-air networks were scrapped.

The report commissioned by the government found that unless networks were forced to spend money on local quotas they would rely on overseas imports.

The Sydney Morning Herald reports Australian children’s programs, dramas, documentaries, and news and current affairs shows would fall by 19 per cent, worth more than $250 million in productions. The amount of money spent on adult drama and children’s programs, would fall by 90 and 100 per cent respectively if quotas were scrapped, the report found.

Free to Air networks are currently required to broadcasr at least 55 per cent of Australian content between 6am and midnight but the convergence report wants to see an increase in sub-quotas in drama, documentaries and children’s programming. That drew a hostile reaction from a number of industry corners.

Pay TV drama channels are required to spend 10% of their budget on local production, but the report suggests without regulation they would fall to 6 per cent – the level it was 12 years ago when the quotas were introduced.

13 Responses

  1. @snoopy888: That is the exact problem, the commercial TV networks produce little other than game shows and infotainment for children. Even the ABC has been doing that the last few years.

    That type of cheap programming could be easily done without, and adds no Australian value.

  2. it would be awful if Australian Content was to disappear.It’s bad enough Ten stopped showing a full hour of Australian Kids Shows from 4 to 5pm like they used to(By law they have to Bold and the Beautiful is not an acceptable 21st Century option for those of us old enough to remember the Wonder World/Double Dare era of the Eighties).

  3. PWC would have been commissioned to do this report as an independent assessor – without a vested interest in the outcome. The quotas underpin the demand for Australian content – but the Networks commission it. This year, and every year, the highest rating programmes are generally Australian. I agree we should aim for higher quality drama – but that wont happen if the quotas don’t exist. I can’t believe some of the uninformed comments on this thread.

  4. One of the original arguments for the quotas was subsidising local production in order to develop talent and improve standards so that local productions could compete with imported programming. This made sense in the days when the industry was in it’s infancy, and it worked to an extent. But the argument no longer holds, especially as quality has been steadily declining.

    TM, yes the media landscape has changed radically. So why stick doggedly to quotas invented for the conditions of another era. The current commercial networks are never going to produce quality drama, so why waste taxpayer’s money on pretending that they might?

  5. @OzJay – Commercial TV is not art, it’s advertising. There is no way quality dramas like ‘Mad Men’ would ever be programmed in prime time because they would never achieve the ratings that “amateur trash” like Rafters does.

    And the days of ‘The Sullivans’ and ‘ACP’ are long gone – the media landscape has completely changed, as has the savviness of audiences.

    I too dream of an Australia where I can watch homegrown drama of the quality of the Sopranos, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, etc, etc, etc – but it just doesn’t rate high enough to warrant the commercials commissioning it. It doesn’t rate high enough in the US for the FTA networks there to make it! That’s the cold hard unfortunate truth.

    Despite all that, I still want to see Aussie made drama on my TV. Yes I want it to be better quality – but giving the green light to stamp it out completely is throwing the baby out with the bath water, IMO.

  6. The Australian quotes should be scrapped, there TV network shouldn’t be forced to subsidize the Australian industry.

    The quality of Australian content for children couldn’t get much worse, especially in terms of animated series. I’m tired of the poor quality compared to overseas, endless repeats, and too many new series been game shows or infotainment (since it is cheap to produced).

    It is ridiculous where terrible series like Dogstar and Sally Bollywood manage to get second series. Even the latest cartoon series (Woodlies) from Flying Bark doesn’t even seem to be trying.

    I’m frequently coming across much better content for children from overseas, which never gets the chance to even be shown on (free to air) TV.

  7. The problem doesn’t seem to be that there’s not enough Australian content…it’s that the Australian content that is shown isn’t very good. Our shows are often made on cheap budgets compared to the american or UK shows and they aren’t that great. (Of course there are exceptions though)

  8. They needed a “report” to tell them that?
    @Jason D. – ” The government could allocate bandwidth for extra channels and fund local productions, which would not interfere with the operations of commercial networks.” They did that twice. Called them ABC and SBS.
    @OzJay – ” I’d rather the schedules were filled with quality American series”.
    Like The Good Wife, that noboby watches.

  9. I’d like to see it increased. Between 6am-Midnight:

    60% Australian content on main networks

    20% Australian content on digital networks

    15% Australian content on pay networks

  10. Maybe the time has come to admit that ditching the quotas might not be a bad move. It’s a long time since Aussie TV produced any outstanding drama (like Brides of Christ or the Kennedy-Miller mini-series), or even consistently worthwhile popular entertainment like The Sullivans or Country Practice or GP. Personally, I’d rather amateur trash like Rafters wasn’t made feasible by quotas. And I’d rather the schedules were filled with quality American series (Homeland, Mad Men, etc) in accessible timeslots. If Australian writers and producers want their material on the airwaves they should aim to be as good as the competition, not get a free pass.

  11. I think that there is not enough Australian drama and too much overseas content. If the quota was scrapped then there would be even less and I think that would lead to the loss of our Aussie TV culture. Not to mention jobs in the industry.

  12. I think some local productions are excellent, however, the problem with local content quotas is that sometimes the networks are forced into showing low quality local content just to reach quotas, when viewers could be watching something more interesting. It’s not reasonable to expect commercial networks to lose revenue because of this. The government could allocate bandwidth for extra channels and fund local productions, which would not interfere with the operations of commercial networks.

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