WIN Television has assured staff that plans are under way for a new program supply agreement to keep the regional broadcaster on the air after it loses access to Nine’s programming in southern NSW, Victoria and Queensland.
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But the future of WIN’s nightly local news bulletins in 15 regional areas remains unclear.
Wollongong-based WIN is expected to switch over to Network Ten programs such as Masterchef, The Project and Family Feud following Nine Entertainment’s surprise announcement on Friday of a five-year affiliation agreement with Southern Cross Austereo.
From July 1, Nine’s coverage of National Rugby League and shows like The Voice, The Block and 60 Minutes will appear on Southern Cross Austereo’s channels, which will drop their Southern Cross Ten branding and be renamed Nine.
WIN’s likely change to Ten’s generally lower-rating programs like The Bachelor and I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here has cast doubt over the regional network’s ability to continue producing local news bulletins, as well as programs like Alive and Cooking and Fishing Australia.
WIN chief executive Andrew Lancaster attempted to reassure WIN’s 750 staff around the country in an email message on Monday.
Mr Lancaster said WIN’s Bermuda-based billionaire owner Bruce Gordon had given company management his “full support in this new era for WIN”.
“As we have always done, we will move forward into a new era and continue to be the biggest television network in Australia and the strongest regional network with the best people in regional broadcasting,” Mr Lancaster said.
Reminding staff that Mr Gordon and WIN were “now the largest shareholders in both the Nine and Ten networks”, Mr Lancaster said WIN was proud to produce “more local news bulletins than our competitors”.
Southern Cross Austereo CEO Grant Blackley has already said his network will increase production of local news for regional Victoria, Queensland and southern NSW after it changes channels to Nine.
Mr Blackley said Southern Cross couldn't afford to produce full local news bulletins while showing Ten’s programs, which generated lower ratings and revenue.
“It strangled us in part from doing all of the things we might have wished to do with local content,” Mr Blackley told Fairfax Media.
WIN itself recently revealed to a Senate committee examining reform of Australia’s media ownership laws that the 3000 hours of local content it produced and broadcast each year “is not a profitable exercise”.
“The amount of revenue generated within the 30-minute local news bulletins is less than the cost of producing and distributing those 30 minutes of content,” WIN told MPs in its submission.
Because WIN’s affiliation fees were paid on overall revenue generated, the regional network said it paid “a very large percentage of the revenue in the WIN Local News Bulletins to Nine Entertainment Co. even though WIN incurs the cost of production and distribution and all of the infrastructure costs that go with the production of those bulletins”.
“In essence WIN pays twice for that 30 minutes of content that goes to air each weekday in the aggregated markets.”
