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Free TV moaning over SBS ads again

Commercial networks again claim they are "subsidising" an increase in SBS advertising.

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2015-03-25_0057

Commercial TV networks are crying poor again in the face of SBS increasing their advertising time.

Bizarrely, they claim they are “subsidising SBS”, due to the broadcaster increasing their primetime advertising under a government legislation proposal, without any mention of its potential impact on print, radio or online advertising.

“Everyone knows that any additional revenues SBS attracts will come from the existing television advertising pie, so effectively commercial broadcasters are being asked to subsidise a government funded broadcaster,” said Free TV Chairman Harold Mitchell.

“The proposed Bill in effect creates a new commercial broadcasting licence by stealth. SBS will have the same amount of advertising in prime-time as commercial broadcasters and they will target the same advertisers with their programming.

“Commercial broadcasters are the major investors in quality Australian programming including drama,
news and sport.

“SBS will not be required to invest one cent of additional revenues in Australian content.”

However SBS has claimed an increase in revenue would allow for more investment in local content. When their license fees were cut under previous governments there was no requirement for first run local content on multichannels. Later legislation allowed for broadcaster flexibility with 1490 hours of local content and quota recognition for shows such as Neighbours, however there is still no first run minimum requirement on multichannels.

The shift to more primetime advertising for SBS follows government funding cuts to the broadcaster, but will not increase their total time of advertising capped at 120 minutes per day.

“This comes on the same day that Netflix has launched in Australia announcing that they will not make any Australian content and that they will not charge any GST on their services in this country,” said Mitchell.

“By contrast Australian commercial broadcasters invest over $1.5 Billion in Australian content, pay a
licence fee on top of our normal taxes and are subject to a raft of regulations that do not apply to any other media platform.

“Allowing SBS to double its advertising in prime-time is bad public policy and will come at the expense
of programming and jobs in commercial free-to-air television.

“We call on the Senate to reject the Bill and ask that the Government and SBS find other efficiencies to fund what they claim is a ‘shortfall’ of just over $7 million a year.”

SBS has previously said, “In an environment where public broadcasting is under pressure and SBS is operating in a highly competitive media market, the ability to generate more of our own revenue would help us to secure the future sustainability of the organisation, without compromising our content.”

SBS claims its total TV ad revenue currently makes up under 2 per cent of the total market annually.

FreeTV Australia has also made no mention of its opposition to a fourth commercial TV license being granted.

Updated.

14 Responses

  1. Commercial Networks as you have stated on TV tonight need to broadcast certain amount of Australian content they are counting recycled old Aussie TV shows like Skippy and those home Shopping channels as part of their quota for Aussie content? Government has cut funding to the ABC and SBS.

  2. Poor commercial networks, what with their 24-hour a day infomercial channels (which is far from what those datacast licences were intended for) that go unchecked, and being able to flout advertising limits on their main channels with sponsors’ ads thinly disguised as “station IDs” and in-program “product integration” that’s about as subtle as a whack to the head. Then there’s the licence fee discounts which now means they’re getting subsidised access to the airwaves, which are a public resource.

    Have they also not noticed that SBS has a market share of around 5%, compared to Nine and Seven sitting around 30% each. Doesn’t exactly pose much of a threat to them IMO.

    1. Good points regarding datacast licenses and the advertising creep with sponsored IDs and in-program product placement. It would seem that SaTaN wants to have it’s cake, eat it, and sell it back to the Australian Public who already own it.

      Should also mention that Mitchell states that Netflix has announced that they will not make any Australian content. I’d like to see a reference/link for that quote as I don’t believe Netflix have said that. In fact, they’ve said the opposite.

  3. Here’s Mitchell again, holding his hand out for a discount on the annual fee to use public radio frequencies to make money with no strings attached (and complaining about it), while banging the table with the other about SBS possibly increasing its share of the TV ad revenue pie to a whopping 3%. Somebody pass me my violin…

  4. Poor old STAN (Seven Ten and Nine) it makes your heart bleed listening to their continual bleating, SBS has four ad breaks, sometimes none, like the Ernie Dingo Docco the other night. Between OZTAM and STAN (maybe it should be SATAN Seven and Ten and Nine) they have made, and have done so for years, viewing a misery in Australia. There is no sympathy out here for any of them and their arrogance

  5. I think you can pretty much always put the word “bizzarely” in front of any claim or statement by Australian commercial TV networks e.g.

    “Bizzarely, The Great Australian Spelling Bee is an exciting, engaging new series and a perfect fit with our strategy of bringing event television to Australians” – TEN program chief Beverley McGarvey.

    etc…

    1. I’m hoping that your misspelling of “bizarrely” while having a dig at The Great Australian Spelling Bee is just to ensure that I maintain my daily irony intake.

      I agree with your sentiment, though.

      1. No, just one of those words I frequently mis-spell – the example I chose simply guaranteed that I would! 🙂

        (p.s. ‘mis-spell’ is not so much wrong as archaic…)

  7. I used to think a 4th network would be a good thing, but as time has gone on and audiences have fragmented, it’s clear that isn’t tenable. Given the way TEN’s been going I’ve been starting to wonder if we might be in for a future of just 2 commercial networks. Look at the UK — they’ve got audience numbers our broadcaster’s could only dream of, yet there’s only really 2 commercial broadcasters; ITV and Ch5 (4 I would regard as ‘sort of’ commercial).

    1. Because of their weather UK viewers would watch more TV at home and they have more choices than us.

      The UK has 5 terrestrial networks providing 5 channels of programs. We have 5 terrestrial networks providing 17 channels of programs. The UK also has heaps of Free To Anywhere TV channels delivered by the Internet, Cable and Satellite. Until recently we only had Foxtel. I think I prefer our system.

      Personally, I hope that TEN survives.

      1. Actually the main UK networks provide far more than the single channel “Perplexed” thinks. BBC has 7 channels, ITV has 5 (plus more on Sky and a few +1 channels on FTA), Channel 4 has 5 channels (and +1 channels), Channel 5 has 4. Many of those are also in HD on Freeview.

        When I scan my box here, I get 150 TV & radio channels. And that’s just free to air. Admittedly many of them are very ordinary, but many have some great content.

        Mind you, the population here is much larger and much more compact. Economies of scale do play a part.

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