CHAIR—Welcome. We have been asking submitters not to repeat their entire submissions in their opening statements but to make a brief opening statement with some salient points, if that is what you wish to do, before proceeding to questions, as we are running on a tight time schedule.
Mr Marquard—Thank you. We certainly do not plan to repeat our submission, which is fairly brief anyway. We thank you for the opportunity to be here today. Premier Media Group produce four channels for subscription television, as many of you know, and we are about to launch two further channels on 1 October: Fox Sports 3 and a 24-hour Fox Sports News channel.
We are a significant investor in Australian sports and sporting bodies, and we have a very strong relationship with a number of codes. The most notable one of recent times is obviously the very significant investment we have made with Football Federation Australia—soccer, football or whichever way you would like to call it. And, as everyone knows, we have a partnership with football which will allow not only the continued growth of the A-League but also significant funds to be developed and channelled back into junior football, junior players and participation for both boys and girls, to enable further development of the sport amongst Australians.
There are three main points we would like to address today, and they are outlined in our submission. The first of those is a very fundamental point about the way in which the bill is drafted. We very strongly believe that there is a fairly significant technical oversight in the drafting which would effectively allow full multichannelling straightaway, contrary to the entire intent of the bill, which is to ensure that antisiphoning sport is premiered only on the main channel. It can be very simply fixed, and we would be happy to elaborate on those points and provide some concrete examples if required.
In relation to that, it is clear that the government’s intent has always been that sport would only be broadcast on the main channel first and simultaneously on either a second channel or an HDTV channel. On that point I will refer to what Senator Coonan said in response to a question from Senator Ronaldson in question time in parliament not so long ago.
Senator CONROY—You are not quoting a dorothy dixer!
Mr Marquard—I do not believe it is a dorothy dixer.
Senator RONALDSON—I remember this question. I spent a lot of time on it.
Senator JOYCE—Maybe you would like to repeat it for us.
Mr Marquard—Senator Conroy, it is very brief. Minister Coonan said:
When limited multichannelling is introduced in 2007 and 2009, both the free-to-air commercial broadcasters and the two national broadcasters will be prohibited from showing antisiphoning sport on their multichannels unless it has been shown on their main channel first.
She went on to say that the government did not want the antisiphoning rules to have ‘the perverse effect of reducing rather than increasing the total availability of sport to consumers’.
Senator JOYCE—I remember watching Ronno write that.
Senator RONALDSON—I remember that answer well.
Senator CONROY—You checked that one with me as well, didn’t you?
Mr Marquard—The second issue we would like to address today—
CHAIR—Very quickly, Mr Marquard.
Mr Marquard—is ‘use it or lose it’, which is something we believe should have legislative force. We are concerned that it is not actually recognised in the bill, and that is something which seems to have support in principle. The third point is that we believe the exception for news and current affairs is too broadly drafted, and we are happy to take questions on that. It is addressed in our submission.
CHAIR—I am sure you will get questions on both.
Senator CONROY—Mr Marquard, you say that evidence already exists for the removal of many events from the antisiphoning list. Could you outline what those events are.
Mr Marquard—The list is still too broadly drafted. A very simple example is the French Open tennis. The French Open tennis is listed, and yet for the last few years it has not been broadcast at all. No free-to-air broadcaster has picked up the event at all. That is a very simple example of something that could be removed straightaway.
Senator CONROY—Have you not been able to show it because of that?
Mr Marquard—We have been able to show it. It does get automatically delisted, but it goes to the principle of ‘use it or lose it’, that something should not continue to have regulatory protection unless it is actually shown live on free-to-air television.
Senator CONROY—You did mention this, but are you concerned that the legislation does not contain any rules on the operation of the use it or lose it regime or are you happy to leave the operation of the scheme at the minister’s discretion?
Mr Marquard—Most definitely we would prefer to see some legislative force in relation to the use it or lose it scheme. We believe that would provide certainty to all parties in relation to it so that everybody could understand exactly where they were. The concern we have at the moment is that the bill as it is going through has very limited recognition of ‘use it or lose it’ as part of the package. We would certainly like to see it given legislative force. We believe that can be accommodated through a fairly simple legislative change, which we are happy to work with the government and the opposition on.
Senator CONROY—You mentioned the French Open. How many events does that cover on the antisiphoning list?
Mr Marquard—The French Open is the quarterfinals onwards of the men’s and women’s. So the quarterfinals of the French Open are covered.
Senator CONROY—So you already covered the earlier rounds because they have already been removed from the list.
Mr Marquard—As part of the amendments announced which took effect on 1 January this year, the entire tournament was pared back. We think that is a very significant and practical solution. That is pretty much what we say should happen in relation to ‘use it or lose it’. ‘Use it or lose it’ is not about removing events which are shown on free-to-air television. Take the example of the two very popular football codes, rugby league and AFL.
0Senator Joyce interjecting—
Mr Marquard—Rugby union, of course. I was talking about the week-to-week ones, Senator Joyce. Five AFL games a week are covered on free-to-air. We say, ‘Keep five games on free-to-air television if that is the go-forward position.’ In relation to rugby league it is two games a week this year, but three out of eight games going forward. ‘Use it or lose it’ is not about removing events which are shown on free-to-air television; it is about removing events which are not shown on free-to-air television from the antisiphoning list.
Senator CONROY—I noticed in this morning’s paper Andrew Demetriou suggesting that all eight of the AFL matches may be