Faafoi Kris: Radio New Zealand Amendment Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFaafoi Kris: Radio New Zealand Amendment Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 17 March 2016. Volume:712;Page:9917. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]KRIS FAAFOI (Labour—Mana): It is a genuine pleasure to speak to the Radio New Zealand Amendment Bill and I want to acknowledge Melissa Lee the speaker who has just made a contribution who is the chair of the Commerce Committee and who as she pointed out herself was a broadcaster and—importantly I think—a broadcaster who was making her own programmes in that creative space. So she does know what she is talking about when we are talking about the broadcasting industry at large.I also want to acknowledge the people who work for Radio New Zealand. I think that—and it has been mentioned on this side of the House—given the financial constraints that it is under and the digital change that the whole industry is undergoing it has responded to those digital changes and the financial challenges in a very effective way. But I think it could have been better and that speaks to our disappointment about the passage of this bill. I think that if you look at the details of the bill itself and the functions of this bill you have to say it is a good bill because it puts in legislation the charter for Radio New Zealand and it enshrines some very important things in my view as a former broadcaster who spent most of his time in public broadcasting. Radio New Zealand by law has to deliver services of the highest quality to inform entertain and enlighten the people of New Zealand to challenge innovate and engage its listeners and to foster crucial thought and informed and wide-ranging debate. As a citizen and as a former broadcaster I think that those functions are very good functions and are ones that hopefully we all support.Unfortunately the last words in this piece of legislation tell the sorry story of the journey of this bill. Melissa Lee pointed out in her contribution that this piece of legislation was introduced on 2 June 2009 and we are here—and there is a degree of hypocrisy here on my part because we are speaking to it and it has taken so long and there have been so many delays but I think it is important that we point this out. I do not want to overly prolong this debate—I want this piece of legislation to pass—but I think it is important that we do point out that in 2009 this piece of legislation came out the select committee reported back in December of that year and it has taken us 6 years as Melissa Lee pointed out herself for this piece of legislation to pass. I think that speaks to the priority that this Government has put on public broadcasting and I think the 6-year wait shows that it is a low priority. It is dangerous not only for some of the functions that I spoke about that are enshrined for Radio New Zealand but also because of the quickly changing nature of the media. If we want Radio New Zealand which I think is our shining light of public broadcasting to be just as good as the ever-changing market with New Zealand Media and Entertainment with Fairfax with our other public broadcaster Television New Zealand and with other media outlets in New Zealand we have to support our radio public broadcaster to make sure it can change with the times and ensure that the high-quality standards that we expect and that it delivers can be delivered as well.Melissa Lee spoke about the convergence—that radio is no longer radio alone. On air at the moment I believe is Checkpoint and it is not just radio alone now. John Campbell since leaving MediaWorks now does his show online—you can watch him do his show. That is why I want to congratulate Radio New Zealand on branching out into that area. But I think the financial constraints that this Government has put on Radio New Zealand are restricting Radio New Zealand’s ability to do more. If we want our public broadcaster to do more—to challenge to inform to have those debates that the charter talks about and to keep that quality—it also needs to be at the forefront of technological changes. I think that the lack of commitment over those 6 years has seriously hamstrung Radio New Zealand. I think you just need to look to Television New Zealand and what the current Government has done there as well. Removing TVNZ 6 and TVNZ 7 again shows a lack of commitment to public broadcasting. I do not know why because I think it is an important thing for our nation to have scrutiny—unbiased scrutiny with integrity—and I think that comes from having a public broadcaster.So when we look at this piece of legislation the functions are great; the journey is awful. Six years is too long to wait for this piece of legislation to pass through this House. A funding freezesince 2009 to keep it to just under $32 million for Radio New Zealand is not good enough for what I would hope we are which is a good functioning democracy.