Australian broadcasters welcome temporary licence fee waiver
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Rebecca Hawkes
| 29 June 2017

The Australian Government is waiving broadcast licence fees for the current financial year, in a gesture that it claims will save free-to-air TV and radio networks around A$127 million.

This ‘one-off relief measure’ comes as Australia’s third TV network Ten battles to cut debts after entering voluntary administration earlier this month.

Nine Entertainment welcomed the Government measures saying they would “result in a reduction in licence fees accrued by Nine in FY17 and paid in FY18 of approximately $33 million".*Southern Cross Austereo said the temporary removal of licence fees "will result in savings...of $11.8 million in the current financial year".

Communications Minister Mitch Fifield said: “Permanent financial relief will be provided through the Government’s Media Reform package, which has the unanimous support of the industry, if passed by the Senate as a whole”.

The reforms propose TV license fees are abolished in favour of a tax on spectrum use. However, the Turnbull Government has so far been able to secure cross-party support for the entire package of reforms.*There will now be a 40-day wait until Parliament returns from recess before Australia’s politicians re-consider media reforms.

Proposals for a change in the two-out-of-three cross media ownership rule, which currently prevent an individual or company from owning a newspaper, TV station and radio station in the same licence area, have met with opposition from the Labor Party.

“Last week, Labor twice voted in the House of Representatives against the entire package, despite claiming they support elements of it,” added Fifield.
Harold Mitchell, the chair of industry body FreeTV Australia said: “Licence fee relief is critical for broadcasters to invest and transform their businesses. It is now up to the Senate to do its part in permanently replacing the licence fee with a spectrum charge”.

“In the internet age, it makes no sense to continue to impose the world’s highest licence fees when these foreign media tech companies pay nothing. If we are serious about diversity of Australian voices, we have got to get serious about comprehensive media reform. We cannot allow local media companies to continue being strangled by out-dated media ownership laws,” Mitchell added.