Hon TREVOR MALLARD (Labour—Hutt South) : I rise to speak on the Television New Zealand Amendment Bill; I have done some work on this area in the past, as the previous Minister of Broadcasting. I did not think I would be speaking tonight; I thought my time would come at some stage in the future. I thought we would hear from the Hon Sir Roger Douglas on this matter, as he is the sole ACT member in the Chamber and has had a lot of interest in Television New Zealand in the past. I thought that he would want to discuss why he is so keen on voting for a bill to keep Television New Zealand in State control, because generally he takes quite the opposite approach to Television New Zealand. Generally, he pushes the National Party to privatise. Although my colleagues see this bill as a step towards privatisation, I am sure it does not go far enough for Sir Roger. I am very, very surprised that he is not prepared to stand up in this House, vent his views, and say what he thinks. As Jonathan Hunt would say, 10 to 10 at night is peak listening time, and it would be an opportunity for him to get his views across.

There are some points in this legislation on which there is agreement. I think we need a method of freeing up the archive material. I am not sure that we have quite got it right. It might be a sign of my age but I think that archive rights-holders from the 1980s still have a significant interest in the material that they produced. We need a mechanism for ensuring that their rights can be identified and delivered to them, and that there can be some discussion, especially where people have significant rights in this material. There is a treasure trove of material within the archives and it would be good to get it out and make it available. We are seeing a lot of replaying of some of that older material on NZ on Screen and it is very, very good. One might say that although the technology was not nearly as good, some of the intellect that went into the programming, and some of the movies that are now being made available, well outstretch some of the things that are being made today.

The other point on which there is a lot of agreement—and I am not sure yet that this Minister of Broadcasting has his head around it—is the question about what is happening in the media world generally, and the fact that a massive convergence is occurring. Frankly, I do not care how the stuff gets to the screen in my living room. I do not mind if it comes via broadband, via broadcast, or via a Vodafone card, although I get slightly unhappy when Darren Hughes appears on my television screen, as I always question the colour settings. I am never sure that the colour is right when Mr Hughes appears on the screen. When he and Mr Hipkins are on the screen I generally have to ring up Sky to see whether someone can come and adjust the picture, because it just does not look human.

Seriously, convergence is occurring, and it is occurring at a very fast pace. Although I have no doubt that the value of Television New Zealand has gone down over recent years, I also have no doubt that a significant factor in that is that people are able to get their news through many other broadcast channels. More important, fewer and fewer people rely on television for content—for news content or for their entertainment content. Many people now use systems other than broadcast television. Many of us get much of our news and our entertainment by way of our computers, and that is the way of the future. I think it is fair to say—and I say this even though I was the Minister for a year—that I do not think that Television New Zealand has done a good job, over the last 15 years, of staying ahead of that sort of trend. It is an organisation that might be said to be at the higher cost end of the production. It pays very little when it is buying material, but if we look at the size of the organisation compared to similar organisations, we see that it is very big. I am sure that will cause it some problems going forward. This bill does not really address any of that area at all.

I come back to the matter of convergence. Many of us are just beginning to get our heads around the way the new media works. A number of the communications companies, phone companies, and similar organisations are quite a long way ahead of Television New Zealand in their understanding of the possibilities of the new media. It is fair to say that even in this House, without going too deeply into Melissa Lee’s personal interests, we have someone who has shown that one can set up a television company with not a lot and produce material that is competitive in particular niche markets. I think we will find over a period of time that more and more people will do that and, as the shift is made from analog to digital, the ability for many more people to do so will occur. I think that will mean that much more variety is available to people; I think a lot of us draw our material internationally.

All of that has implications for the television organisation that, frankly, is not much different from the one I started watching television on in 1961 when I lived in Wainuiōmata.

Hon Darren Hughes: Are you still there?

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: I have gone a long way: I have gone 100 yards round the corner. I am not sure that the organisation that we are expecting to be our primary provider of unbiased—

Hon Christopher Finlayson: You were a Khandallah boy.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: Wainuiōmata in 1961.

Hon Christopher Finlayson: I thought you went to Onslow College.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: I did go to Onslow College, but I assure the member that that was well after 1961. He might not have been born in 1961, but I went to secondary school well after that.

The point I was trying to make is that Television New Zealand will have to be a nimble organisation, and I am not sure that anything in this bill helps it to do that. I say to the Minister that as far as his Platinum Fund, or whatever it is called, is concerned, I was the Minister who shifted the charter money to New Zealand On Air. I shifted it. I am a sports nut, but pretending that an Olympic Games production is an iconic New Zealand production and deserving of charter funds—it was won in a competitive tender; no one else could have used charter funding for sports production out of Beijing—is wrong. For me, that was the straw that broke the camel’s back and caused me to take from Television New Zealand the control of its charter funding. I do not think that it was using it well. I do not think it was using it properly or in New Zealand’s interests. I think, though, that the Minister has gone too far in his approach to put it out for open tender. It is my opinion that such an approach—I raise a point of order, Mr Speaker. I thought I had about another 40 seconds to speak. Is that not the case?

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: 4 seconds.

Hon TREVOR MALLARD: Another 40 seconds; thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker! The point I was making is that this bill just—

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER: I am sorry to interrupt the member, but his time has expired.