Pressure is on Labor and crossbenchers to pass Coalition media reforms.
A rare mass gatheringof media chief executives will bein chilly Canberra on Wednesday puttingthe heat on Labor andcrossbenchers to passthe government's proposed media reforms without amendments.
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Australia's media ownership laws are due for an update, and the media barons are set to benefit.
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Australia's media ownership laws are due for an update, and the media barons are set to benefit.
Having successfully argued for more cuts to broadcast licence fees and accepted restrictions on gambling ads, the companieswant to keep up the momentum for change.
Communications Minister Mitch Fifield has proposed a basket of reforms that enjoys total industry support, but does not yet have enough senatorial support.
Newspaper, television and radio executives will argue reform is vital for survival at a time when more and more eyeballs and advertising revenue are going to unregulated online sites.
They do not see a sustainable future for all of Australia's existing media companies, and say concentration will occur eitherthrough legal mergers or corporate collapse.
While industry is united, the move to scrapcross-ownership rules has attracted objections from Labor, Greensand One Nation.
Minister Fifield is still sevenvotes short of getting the bill through the Senate. But he will succeed ifeither Nick Xenophon or Pauline Hanson and theirparties vote with the Coalition.
The big sticking point is scrapping the two-out-of-three rule, which stops one entity owning print, radioand television in one city.
One Nation is concerned removing therestriction will lead to "monopoly control of media distribution in a single region".
Senator Xenophonhas hinted he may support the laws if it includes some tax or levy on Facebook and Google, which profit from all the content created by other companies.
There are still restrictions stopping one entity owning more than one television or two radio stations, and some rules about having at least five independent companies in cities and four in regional areas.
But Labor, which introduced the two-out-of-three rule in the 1980s, is still worried its removal will reduce voices and ideas.
"The widely acknowledged fact is that removing the two-out-of-three rule will lead to further media consolidation and, consequently, a reduction in diversity of media control in Australia," opposition communications spokeswoman Michelle Rowland said.
The Greenswill propose splitting the bill to protectthe two-out-of-three rule, said senatorScott Ludlam, communications spokesman.
"We are not really here to advocate for the corporate interest, but protecting the public interest as much as possible," he added.
But most parties are happy to pass what is known as the reach rule, which currently prevents metro networks like Seven, Nine and Tenfrom owning regional broadcastersSouthern Cross, Prime and WIN. These are themost likely mergers if the laws passas there is potential to immediately save money on back-office costs like administration, legal fees, broadcasting facilitiesand affiliation fees.
There are less obvious savings in merging mastheads and broadcasters, except that both produce news content. News Corp has successfully merged some editorial content from pay TV service Sky News with mastheads, with several columnists and journalists appearing on both. But Fairfax Media (publisher of BusinessDay) has very little editorial overlap between mastheads like The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, with its part-owned radio stations 2GB and 3AW.
Chief executive of regional broadcasterWIN Television,Andrew Lancaster, believes Australians are getting so much news from online sources that the reach rule and two-out-of-three are now irrelevant.
"The best way to protect diversity is by having healthy, viable media companies," he said.
But whether Australians see the online outlets such asThe Guardian,BuzzFeed, TheNew York Times,CrikeyandHuffingtonPost as equal to the task of today's newspapers, radioand television stations is yet to be seen.
Professor of communication at Deakin University, Matthew Ricketson, said industry consolidation is the most likely impact of the rules passing as an entire package.
The worst outcome from the new laws would be "ownership of the media in an already concentrated market for newspapers, radio and television will becomingeven more concentrated", he said.
"The diversity provided by the internet is diversity of opinion. That is not the same as diversity of sources of news and current affairs reporting," he added.
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Is Australia ready to scrap its 30-year-old media cross-ownership laws? - The Sydney Morning Herald