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Follow links below for transcripts and sound files. The sound files are streamed through Windows Media Player. If necessary, you can download this player here.
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to this
speech - 1hr 7min) Greg Dyke was Director-General of the BBC from January 2000 until his resignation in early 2004. He put a forceful case for the central importance of a public-service broadcaster in his speech to the conference.
Greg Dyke argues that audiences are not one-dimensional. Putting public broadcasting at the heart of a TV system recognises that people are both citizens and consumers.
In terms of television, globalisation means “Americanisation” – and so the BBC's ability to invest in local programming is what will give it a place “in the broadcasting landscape of the 21 st century”.
Reflecting people's culture and values will be increasingly important in a multi-channel environment. The BBC has launched two children's channels that are unabashedly British and are advertising free – they are both now in the top three children's channels in the UK .
A well-funded public broadcaster changes the rules of the game, forcing commercial broadcasters to raise programme quality and invest in local production.
Size and money matters if you want to make outstanding programmes – secure funding is important as is the recognition that broadcasting is a creative process that can wither under too much performance setting.
A public broadcaster through the power of its brand plays an important role in broadening the access to new technology. The BBC's digital service Freeview has been the fastest growing consumer product in the UK recently.
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to this session - 33 minutes into recording) Greg Dyke responded to a number of questions from New Zealand broadcasters following his address. Some of his responses give a window on where TV is heading in one of the world's largest and most sophisticated markets.
On the funding of public-service broadcasting : Despite its unfairness, the licence-fee system has resulted in a “pretty good broadcasting system” – competing for funding directly with other government agencies could disadvantage the BBC.
On the impact of digital TV : The market will not be able to provide all the opportunities or meet the demands of the digital age. The BBC is responding to digitisation by releasing for free downloading all those programmes or parts of programmes where it holds copyright and by building deep levels of interactivity into its programmes.
On how to measure what audiences do with TV : The current generation watch less TV but use other electronic media. The BBC is increasingly looking at the reach of its programmes – how often its services are used and who doesn't use them.
On the future of mass-audience channels : There's still a place for mass channels, even if their ratings will be lower now. The job of those channels will be to reflect the changing ethnic mix and nature of society.
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to this speech - 15min ) Tim Gardam was Director of Television at Channel 4 in the UK for five years from 1998 to the end of 2003. In his afterword to Greg Dyke's address he put the case for contestable public-service broadcasting.
Tim Gardam begins by arguing that the BBC's very success has begun to raise questions about whether its market dominance is “crowding out” worthwhile initiatives by commercial TV channels.
Public broadcasting is even more valuable in today's fragmented, diverse, individualistic and increasingly globalised world – diversity of programming in the UK is at risk from digital TV rating wars.
There needs to be more than one public-service broadcaster if television public values are to really take root. Channel 4 is funded entirely by advertising and can take more risks than the BBC. It can be a catalyst that stimulates taste, formats, and fresh programme making by small creative companies.
Public broadcasting offers a “prism” for the continuing debate about the values of the market and those of society.
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to this speech - 22min ) Steve Maharey is Minister of Broadcasting. Here he sets out the policy context of public broadcasting.
Steve Maharey's central theme is that we are exploring at the start of the 21 st century what it means to be a New Zealander within a dynamic, changing and diverse culture. Public broadcasting is part of this continuing conversation.
Government is looking at setting a policy framework so that a mixed economy of broadcasting from pure commercial to community initiatives can flourish and find its place.
Trying to describe the ideal broadcasting system allows us look at how to move forward by asking the hard questions. What do we expect from public broadcasting? How do we set and measure those expectations? Do we have the right structure for the challenges ahead? How do we move to the digital world? How do we get the funding right? What roles are appropriate in our broadcasting system?
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to this speech - 32min ) Bob Collins was Director-General of RTÉ (Radio Television Éire) from April 1997 until October 2003. His speech outlined the key challenges lying ahead for public broadcasting.
Bob Collins believes that definitions of public broadcasting always try to limit its possibilities. The argument is really about what is the appropriate scope for public policy intervention in broadcasting?
Public and private broadcasters add real choice to any broadcasting framework. The public broadcaster's role is to be inclusive of the entire audience – and this can be seen in the history of broadcasting in Ireland .
To those who would like to restrict public broadcasting to areas of market failure or market indifference, Bob Collins suggests two contrary principles. The first is that viewers and listeners are individuals and citizens – and so broadcasting like education should be universally available. The second principle is competition – this leads to diversity of programming because the audience has real choice.
In small countries, a combination of advertising and public funding is the model for many public-broadcasting systems. An important question here is: “Does the funding shape the content?”
Public broadcasters need to put the audience at the centre of what they do. They also need to keep their nerve and their principles in the face of challenges to their role and scope. You have to want to be a public broadcaster. What matters is the personal and social impact of an activity – its cultural heft – and that applies equally to new technologies and public broadcasting.
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to this discussion - 1hr 22min) Panel and Floor Discussion: New Zealand Broadcasters Respond to Bob Collins – chaired by Jo Tyndall, Chief Executive of NZ On Air. The role public broadcasting can play in defining cultural identity was the central theme of the panel discussion's keynote speakers and responses from the floor.
Ian Fraser , Chief Executive of TVNZ, began by placing TVNZ in a viewer context. As a public broadcaster, its “bargain” is with the viewers to provide something for all of them within the range of what it broadcasts. TVNZ's Charter gives the flavour of where it is going through the themes of culture and identity and innovation and creative risk.
Sharon Crosbie , the retiring Chief Executive of Radio NZ, saw a charter as strongly positive. If you have a statutory charter, you have a power you didn't have before. Public funding is vital because it gives the public a sense of ownership of institutions and not just programmes.
The sustenance and aspiration of the tangata whenua is the intent behind the Maori Television Service. Dr Leonie Pihama , a board member of MTS, set out MTS's aims and cautioned that a “coherent” public broadcasting framework should not mean a singular view.
The theme of fostering a multiplicity of views was picked up by Brent Impey , Chief Group Executive of CanWest New Zealand . A foreign model of public broadcasting isn't needed, as our Kiwi mixed model of public and private broadcasting is leading edge in many ways. For instance, New Zealand on Air's contestable funding has led to great diversity in local TV programming and music.
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to this discussion - 1hr 23min) Panel and Floor Discussion: Reflecting Ourselves – chaired by Martin Mathews, Chief Executive, Ministry for Culture and Heritage. Panel members and the audience explored the role and reach of regional, cultural and community broadcasting in “reflecting ourselves”.
Niu FM has been a spectacular success in the Auckland radio market. Simativa Perese , Chair of the National Pacific Radio Trust, regards Niu FM as an example of how New Zealand radio had gone past Britain by creating a nationwide broadcasting service to meet the needs and aspirations of a particular cultural group – the growing Pacific community.
Terri Byrne – the Broadcast Manager of Auckland's access radio, Planet FM – saw access radio as not reflecting ourselves but being ourselves. It places ordinary people at the centre of the process without an editor. On-demand delivery of programmes could make access radio the resource library of people's lives.
Southland TV has been a precarious financial but undoubted community success. Tom Conroy , Southland TV's Managing Director, saw the channel's role as “unashamedly parish pump” – filling those niches where national broadcasters can't be everything to everyone. Good-quality programmes are made not from lots of money but from enough money.
Hone Harawira – the Chair of Whakaruruhau (the Federation of Maori Radio Stations) – argued that Maori radio exists because of the case that was made for Maori language. His home station Tehiku in Kaitaia has promoted te reo as widely as possible by creating spin-off stations such as Sunshine FM (for a predominantly Pakeha audience) and Tai FM (for a young Maori audience).
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to this interview - 52min) The future of public broadcasting receives a searching examination in this interview between Ian Fraser (Chief Executive of TVNZ) and Michael Jackson (Chairman of Universal Television Group) and formerly BBC Director of Television and Chief Executive of Channel 4 in the UK .
In the interview, Michael Jackson challenges the term public broadcasting as a “pointless juju stick“ with paternalistic and “heritage theme park” connotations. He makes a case that not for profit is a better way of describing the need to intervene in the TV marketplace.
Market failure is not the main issue today: not-for-profit TV's role is to innovate and “push the fabric and culture of broadcasting”. Competitive multi-channel environments are creating new models – serious audience flow between channels challenges broadcasters to provide programmes of real value to their viewers.
A strong and adequately funded not-for-profit broadcaster exercising leadership is vital. This broadcaster needs to have a sophisticated view of society and its role if it is to “make the popular good and the good popular”.
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to this discussion - 1hr) Panel and Floor Discussion: Initiatives and Innovation – chaired by Jane Wrightson, Chief Executive of the Broadcasting Standards Authority. A lively and provocative discussion explored what public broadcasting means and the challenges and opportunities it faces from new technologies.
Public broadcasting is “bloody good”, broadcasting, claimed Ian Taylor , Managing Director of Taylor-Made Media and Animation Research. The greatest threat to public broadcasting was choice –multi-channel TV, the internet, broadband, and game boxes. We have to look forward, but have no guarantee that the public wants what we're offering.
Manu Taylor , Programme Director of Mai FM, emphasised that – whether it's radio, TV, the internet, or computer games – content and relevance were still key audience drivers. Mai FM survives on commercial advertising but the station aims to promote tikanga and te reo Maori. It can only do that if people want to listen.
New Zealand 's unique model of broadcasting is one of its strengths for Janine Morrell of Whitebait Productions. NZ on Air funds virtually all local children's TV and its contestability ensures fresh ideas and innovation appear onscreen. Good ideas speak to children everywhere and not just locally.
Paul Reynolds challenged broadcasters to place the internet at the centre of what they're doing because it's the “biggest cultural revolution” of our time. Janine Morrell responded with some of the interactivity that is being planned for future children's programming. Ian Taylor agreed that the internet was really important, but suggested it had often promised more than it delivered.
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to this summing up - 58min ) Summary and Conclusions: Hugh Rennie, a former Chair of the Broadcasting Corporation of New Zealand , Bob Collins, Tim Gardam, Michael Jackson, and Steve Maharey gave various reflections to close the conference.
For Hugh Rennie broadcasting explores and enlightens us about what we are, where we may go, and what we may become. A well-calibrated broadcasting system has “public” and “commercial” broadcasting – the mix is something you adjust as you journey forward. Broadcasting is integral to our lives and needs to exist on the public's terms and be accountable to it.
Among Bob Collins's closing thoughts was that a community should be in continuous conversation with itself about the nature of its broadcasting and how societal changes affect our expectations. Maori TV needed the freedom to be different because it's not just replicating existing TV in a different language.
Tim Gardam explored how the creative tension between “public” and “commercial” broadcasting can lead to good things on both sides if the system is calibrated properly. NZ On Air is a good example of a mechanism that encourages the “market to be more brave”.
Diversity was also emphasised by Michael Jackson . Multiple access points for independent producers are crucial to advancing a broadcasting system. But radio needed more attention – as it could be the medium of the future.
Steve Maharey's remarks emphasised that a central theme was the importance of relevance and connecting with the audience. The independence of broadcasters needed to become a “touchstone of our broadcasting system”.