'This needs to go back to the drawing board' ... Independent MP Rob Oakeshott has slammed the proposed media reforms.
The Gillard Government’s controversial media reforms are teetering on the brink of defeat after crucial Independent Rob Oakeshott told Prime Minister Julia Gillard - in person and in writing - that he would vote against all six bills.
Mr Oakeshott said he was unable to support the reforms because of ‘‘weak policy and poor process’’ and the government’s handling of the issue had turned it into an ‘‘own goal’’.
Mr Oakeshott had previously said he was ‘‘disinclined’’ to support the package, but the government had hoped to win him over during last minute negotiations.
‘‘Sadly, this needs to go back to the drawing board,’’ he told Fairfax Media.
The government needs the votes of five out of the seven crossbench MPs for the media bills, which it insists must pass the House of Representatives by Tuesday.
With debate due to begin Tuesday morning, it has no definite commitments of support, with all crossbench MPs raising concerns about aspects of the policy and the rushed timeframe they had been given to consider it.
Some of the worries are shared by government ministers who were presented with the reforms as a fait accompli at last Tuesday’s Cabinet meeting and have been dismayed at the immediate backlash.
The Greens are particularly worried about the potential for the press regulator - the Australian Press Council - to splinter into many smaller regulators, while former Labor MP Craig Thomson is concerned about the power invested in a single person with the proposed new public interest media advocate.
The government has said if the bills are not passed through both houses of parliament by the end of the week they will be withdrawn. The reforms were also roundly attacked by executives from all major media companies, who travelled to Canberra to express their deep concerns at two separate committee hearings over more than ten hours.
The only reform some supported was the proposal to make permanent cuts to television licence fees and to abolish the ‘‘reach rule’’ that limits a single network to broadcasting to three quarters of the Australian population. But it is not yet included it in the legislation and will only be drafted if a joint committee approves it in the next two days.
Competing networks no longer support abolishing the reach rule since they discovered Nine Entertainment and Southern Cross Media were planning to exploit the proposal to proceed with a $4 billion merger. None of the media executives back the planned government-appointed Public Interest Media Advocate to oversee the regulation of newspapers and to judge whether mergers and acquisitions of media companies would be in the ‘‘public interest’’.
News Limited chief executive Kim Williams indicated he could launch a High Court challenge against the bills if they became law, saying they were a "direct government intervention and regulation of the media" and ‘‘a direct attack on free speech, innovation, investment and job creation’’.
Other media executives were also concerned about the haste with which the complex reforms had been rammed through parliament.
‘‘To be plain, the impression, voiced almost universally over the weekend is that the process is at least unseemingly rushed and the bills mirror that state of affairs,’’ said Fairfax Media chief executive Greg Hywood.
Seven boss Kerry Stokes said in his 40-year career he has never seen "the breadth of legislation being pushed through" in such a short space of time. "I can only recall legislation being pushed in this haste in the wake of 9/11," Mr Stokes said.
Network Ten chief, Hamish McLennan, agreed the reforms were too complex and important to be passed in a week. ‘‘I don’t think we can afford to have this rushed through,’’ he said.
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