Media faces reporting on its own decline

Soft advertising, deteriorating finances, job losses, a spectacular own goal and unkind words from Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters — it’s been a tough year for the media.

And the Government has not yet shown any inclination to ride to the rescue.

There is no official count of journalists in New Zealand, and nor could there be, given there is also no such thing as an official journalist.

But 1635 people recorded their profession as journalism in the 2018 census, of whom 1197 identified as print journalists and 219 each as radio journalists and television journalists, according to the Tertiary Education Commission.

That total was down 52% on the tally in the 2000 census, and Massey University associate professor of journalism James Hollings believes that figure will have fallen by a further few hundred since 2018.

For comparison there are about 16,400 lawyers and an estimated 3500 sex workers, to pick another couple of professions that sometimes fret about their public image.

To rattle through the recent litany of woes, MediaWorks, which owns about half the country’s commercial radio stations, closed its flagship current affairs station Today FM in April, with auditor PwC since voicing doubt over the firm’s viability beyond 2025.

Newshub owner Warner Bros Discovery NZ has been more happily bankrolled by its US parent so far, but still posted a $35m loss and announced its 7pm current affairs show The Project would be axed as it transitions to a “digitally-led operating model”.

TVNZ is also planning to cut local productions after sinking from a bumper profit of $59m in the year to June 2021 – thanks to a Covid-enforced drop in its spending on programmes – to a waferthin $1.7m profit this year.

New Zealand Herald owner NZME is also transitioning from print to “digital” and says the number of journalists it employs is little changed over the past five years, at about 300.

Nevertheless, its interim profit slumped 76% this year to also approximate the price of an upmarket villa in Freemans Bay.

RNZ has been shielded from cuts thanks to its public funding.

But Victoria University academic Peter Thompson, chairperson of lobby group Better Public Media, says “we don't know what National's policy vision for public media is, other than opposing whatever it was that Labour had put in place”.

Should the Budgetchallenged Government be looking for an excuse to make cuts, an NZ-On-Air funded study pointed to a significant drop in the audience for RNZ’s flagship RNZ National station, with 8% of people now tuning in each day versus 12% two years ago.

Then there’s the aforementioned own goal of a former RNZ staffer having edited 36 Reuters and the BBC stories to suit his tastes, often injecting a proRussian viewpoint.

As a private, locally-owned business,