Almost $20 million budget cut to RNZ is met with … near silence from Kiwis
Written By:
- Date published:
8:06 pm, July 3rd, 2025 - 68 comments
Categories: Christopher Luxon, david seymour, journalism, Media, media abuse, paul goldsmith, winston peters -
Tags: guardian, peter dutton, Public interest journalism, rupert murdoch
Australia’s national broadcaster is called Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).
It’s regularly attacked by Rupert Murdoch’s Sky News & Australian broadsheet – as well as Atlas Network think tanks such as IPA – as “wasting taxpayers money”
The last Liberal (conservative) leader Peter Dutton also labelled ABC (and the Guardian) as “hate media”.
But over 80% of Australians trust ABC.
Here in New Zealand, the government cut RNZ’s budget by $18m over four years in the last budget – that’s almost $5m a year.
Now RNZ is starting to ask for voluntary redundancies when we already have too little quality media coverage as it is.
But not enough interest or even outrage from Kiwis? Why?
Just two points:
- National is moving rapidly on the privatisation agenda. Last year Luxon told media that everything is up for grabs from a privatisation perspective – schools, hospitals, waters etc. On health1, they’ve been busy implementing the Noam Chomsky formulate: The standard technique of privatisation: defund, make sure things don’t work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital.RNZ are the only outlet I’ve seen systematically cover our health system over the last year and a half RNZ and some other outlets (e.g. Newsroom, Spinoff NZ Geo etc) provide an important service not done by corporate media (NZME / Stuff) and I think it’s essential it – and all non-corporate, public interest media – is protected
- Paul Goldsmith said when he announced RNZ’s budget that: “I expect RNZ to improve audience reach, trust and transparency.” i.e. he inferred they are not doing well on those things.
But RNZ is our national broadcaster with a specific charter.
It has been the one to break news such as Casey Costello’s smoke free repeal and senior Ministers’ talking points basically being a copy and paste of tobacco lobbying notes. The $216m of tax cuts for tobacco companies. The doctors whistleblowing about front-line hiring freezes when the govt was still lying about it.
No-one else broke those stories – so what was not trustworthy or transparent about RNZ, in Goldsmith’s eyes?
RNZ’s charter states its foremost obligation is “to serve the public interest”.
To get a sense of what that means, it means caring about thing that most Kiwis would care about, e.g. health privatisation, lies from government, corruption etc – but stories are only valuable if they are contextual, accurate, factual and provide cogent analysis.
After RNZ’s budget was cut, they had a few spicy headlines calling out the government, but over the last weeks, they’ve become again much more of a government press release company – copying and pasting government statements without scrutiny.
The end result may be it veers increasingly away from showing spirit. Without courage, journalism dies. Without the fourth estate, democracy can die.
We should all care.
PS The budget was cut reportedly because RNZ offended the sensibilities of David Seymour, but Winston Peters is also on the record threatening RNZ journalists and funding in April 2025.
Peters said to Morning Report: “”You’re paid for by the taxpayer and sooner or later we’re going to cut that water off too, because you’re an abuse on the taxpayer”.”
In response, Christopher Luxon said he would not intefere.
PS
Winston Peters’ 2019 Speech as Deputy PM to Jacinda Ardern
Peters:
In 1965, [in NZ, Sir Hollyoake] was the champion of the News Media Ownership Bill, designed to block Rupert Murdoch’s attempted takeover of the Dominion Post. Holyoake fought hard to protect the ownership of New Zealand media outlets.
He argued the dissemination of news media is something special, and it was more than “a biscuit factory”, as he put it. To quote him -”it is very much in our national interest that we have our own voice or voices to express our national identity and character.”
The barriers to protect the ownership of our media organisations were broken by this country’s neo-liberal experiment, for which we still pay the price today.
My party’s fundamental position always has been and remains that a fourth estate is essential, although sadly the news media is in dire straits.
*This is a reprint from MT
**The speech of Winston Peters above is sourced from Stephanie Cullen
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https://www.stuff.co.nz/politics/360745830/christopher-luxon-denies-rnzs-funding-cut-was-sending-message-about-its-journalism
Looks like a personal attack from winston 2.0 slippery seymour, while luxury luxon runs cover defense
Excellent pithy one liner. Yes, the threats are being enacted without any consultation.
The danger is obvious to most here, but some think only of the dollars. Information is currency, used by the powerful, and drip fed through a political lens.
An entree instead of a meal.
RNZ has lost 30% of its listeners over the last five years. This equates to near 200k people. Clearly the product is crap and if the product is crap there is a genuine question as to whether we the taxpayers should continue to fund it. I don’t know if the product is crap because of a loss of trust or from terrible content (I’m too young to listen to radio).
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/media-insider/media-insider-rnz-national-and-morning-report-radio-audiences-fall-to-lowest-levels-in-more-than-five-years/ANJ73IKYMRBXFOADL7RKCXM2NY/
please fix your username for the next comment.
In the naughty books for a typo haha. Was not an intentional change.
"RNZ has lost 30% of its listeners over the last five years"
There are two reasons for that.
One is called Paul Thompson, and the second is called Paul's BFF Willie McAlister.
Between them, they seem to think PSB is just radio (and tlevision) without the ads
Are they the ones who brought in gower…?
Part of the reason for the drop in numbers, I think, is because they are trying too hard to appeal to a broader audience culturally, politically and demographically.
Sports coverage is valid and ok but why they are so hot on UFC is beyond me, it's a MAGA sport for thugs and directly contributes to the violence committed by young men on our street at night. UFC fans are not a legitimate audience target for a public broadcaster, it's a sport amply supported by private media by definition.
RNZ need to do a few things well rather than many things poorly.
Interesting take. UFC doesn’t do it for me personally, but a lot of my peers absolutely love it. It may contribute to the violence statistics in young men, but I would think that impact pales in comparison to having a good father figure and or male role models when growing up.
Not sure what absent fathers have to do with my comment. Seems like deflection to me.
You were concerned about the loss of listeners and I made the point that their strategy seems to be to appeal outside their traditional, core demographic. It clearly not working too well because the numbers say so.
Perhaps you subscribe to the nut job idea RNZ is still too woke and needs to continue further to the right?
I don’t listen to radio. I’m not a geriatric like you, you old fart. You were the one who bought up violence in young men to start that Segway….
Yours was the segue. You initially made a statement about the drop in numbers without analysis, said you didn't know why, and that you didn't listen to any radio, let alone RNZ.
I offered a reasoned point that RNZ are trying to appeal to too broad an audience and illustrated that with their current obsession UFC. Then you brought up deadbeat dads.
Courtesy of Roy Morgan
And in response, the dinosaur Left:
"thebiggestfish7" (who I suspect is Millennial or Gen-Z) has already explained to you how popular UFC is with young men, which is likely why RNZ is trying to cover it. They'll fail because they're late to the party and the area is covered in more depth and with more knowledge by podcasters.
Admittedly I'm Gen-X so don't get UFC's popularity either, but also as "fish7" has explained, the violence we see likely has more to do with families with no male role models, let alone Dads, than the UFC.
But you keep bashing men @Muttonbird (I'm surprised you didn't use the term "toxic masculinity") as you've learned to do since the great Counter-Culture days of the 60's and fish-needing-bicycles, and I'll keep counting their votes for the RW.
Yawn.
I know UFC is popular with young men. Some of them also follow and therefore legitimise Andrew Tate and Tommy Robinson. Presumably you think it's ok for young men to be influenced by these guys?
Trump is heavily linked with UFC and is bringing the violence to the White House. Classy:
https://www.1news.co.nz/2025/07/04/trump-wants-ufc-fight-at-white-house-to-celebrate-us-250th-anniversary/
And what's with the RW suddenly embracing identity politics. Thebiggestidiot7 and now you are desperate to advertise your generational identity, something which nut jobs usually crucify the socially responsible for.
I would be interested to know where your young self gets news from? The reason being is from what I can see most "young" people are to quick to skim a headline and use that as the bases of their news knowledge, without knowing where that "news" is being reported from. This is not meant to be an attack on you personally I am interested in your thoughts
For international news I subscribe to the Apple News app. Sports news I consume through podcasts. NZ local news I peruse NZHerald and Stuff websites and local politics I like to read the opinions on thestandard, daily blog, kiwiblog and norighturn. Twitter is good for breaking news but needs even more fact checking than the MSM.
Thanks for the response, its intriguing to me you think RNZ probably shouldn't be funded if its crap, though you are to young to listen to it, but then are happy to read RW funded articles on the Herald etc. Almost like you have fallen into the RW playbook there which my friend is entirely your right to do so. I look forward to your generation fixing everything the dinosaurs have done. I'm not old enough to fall into that category. 🙂
Tb7 you've got it the wrong way round. 200k people can't be bothered listening to informed opinion and factual matter any more. It's easier to follow crap and misinformation especially when it fits into a favoured bias.
Maybe when you grow up you will be more selective and support news outlets that base their stories on fact and not fiction.
And maybe when dinosaurs like you move on, radio will be a distant memory. Then my generation can fix all the screw ups you lot caused after being gifted everything.
"radio will be a distant memory……"
I am sure Mike Hosking and all his fan club listeners on ZB would have something to say about that……..
I don't listen to radio.
But reading RNZ's factual and well researched journalism will be sorely missed.
If the next generation end up prefering the uneducated witterings of Facebook "influencers" "shock jocks" and right wing meme writers, as they seem to be doing, they will cock things up even more than previous generations.
And quite a few of your generation will end up being "gifted " boomers inheritances.But you are so pure and noble you will refuse the bequests , as such benefits are somehow dishonourable and unfair
Note that RNZ have been losing listeners since they attempted to become "more commercial". Funny that.
How many follow/followed their web site as I have been for decades now. Even though, I only listen to the radio for music when out of range of streaming services.
The coalition wants media that asks no questions and is grateful for whatever talking points its ministers want to dish out.
RNZ does what TVNZ should be doing however that’s gutted, has a celebrity RW board and SFA broadcasting experience in the CEO chair for a many of the past 15 years etc
The problem is if it becomes only an echo chamber for a certain group of people (clearly getting smaller by the day) then it is not really worth the funding and does nothing for informing the general public like a true fourth estate.
They break stories that others pick up on so the actual listening live audience is irrelevant IMO.
Its called public broadcasting and RNZ have delivered much to the coalitions annoyance.
Don't argue with fish. He's very young. So young he thinks he/she knows way more than us old dinosaurs grunting and growling our way through the urban forests.
Yes ..he has the arrogance of youth..
But a lot of what he sez is on the mark…
I don’t agree with his defending call ..but his profile of young news consumers makes sense..
IMHO..
And his denunciation of my fellow boomers stands tall..
'defending' of course should be defending..
2 modern ills: predictive text and algorithms..
IMHO…
Heh..!..my predictive text correction…predictived me..
De-fund…
Public broadcasting is hard for millennials and gen Z's to wrap their heads around.
They all have their own echo chambers in SM etc that align with their personal beliefs.
@ fish…
And what do you see as a 'true 4th estate'..?_
And I would question yr claim of an ever shrinking audience for the concerns covered by rnz…
..as the young are more left than the old…
How rnz more directly speaks to them is another matter..
But the audience for progressive media is definitely out there…
And that should be the main priority for rnz IMHO…
..building that audience..
I could say not all Kiwis ? Personally I look at RNZ every day, and often Link to The Standard RNZ articles/news. Always something of interest (and very eclectic too)
Strangely some (few) commenters here…see RNZ as rightwing? Have to lol, as in the other mirror… its RedRadio (as always, some see what they…see : )
Anyway re David Seymour, of course any
PBSnational Broadcaster, is primally antithetical toAtlasACT.Like his older crony Winston Peters, he is a populist….albeit very much more dangerous.
They can furiously dogwhistle to their morons (marching and otherwise) about this woke radio (update from RedRadio : ) and because they, at present, have power ( I fervently hope briefly) they can try to instigate cuts.
Also keep up your awesome work MT. Almost surgical in its reveal
: )
Yes, MT gets to the heart of issues through excellent research.
Reflecting on David Seymour's behaviour in this. He can't help "crowing" and showing a weakness Jacinda alluded to, "arrogance"
This from a person who has formed an expensive new Ministry of Regulations, pushing a costly Bill for the fourth time, no expense spared. Arrogance.
Public Broadcasting needs Public money.
We are fighting the click laden digital spiral into "shock and awe" i.e. War will sell more news than Community and Culture.
Why? They redirect more money to have more power.
The failed merger with TVNZ is coming back to haunt them and us.
A future government will need to revisit merging legacy media very fast.
Today Stuff are massively shrinking with 15 newspapers closing and tonnes of redundancies.
There's no way back to what it was.
You reckon..?..
I always viewed that idea with the question:..why..?
I can't see what benefits either of them from them being mashed together..
Of course rnz should have more audio-visual…(website running live feeds from studios would be a good start…)
But they don't need tvnz to do that..
And what would tvnz get from it…?
I haven’t watched tvnz for approaching a decade…
I don’t think shoehorning rnz into it would make me watch again,.
Ye olde back office synergy to reduce administration costs of IT, finance, etc.
Then you share premises and sources like AAP, Reuters etc reducing licences.
You reduce the duplicate management cross train radio and TV journos as a start. Not that hard really.
Yes..I can see those admin/back office reasons..
I am talking about their deeply contrasting cultures .
Is that enough reason to fold our only bbc clone ..into the commercial/corporate driven tvnz .?
i don't think so…
Tvnz would eat it…
.. and if that training was more of a focus, producing more people with Jack Tame and whoever does his research's focus the reporting landscape would be better respected. You don't have to agree with his angle, but he comes with obvious diligence into and interview – it's pretty rare.
Having been a listener since kiddies shows circa 1980, I must say it's getting very difficult.
Ah, the RNZ Sunday morning children's stories – Sparky and the Talking Train; Thunderbirds Are Go!
https://storytime.rnz.co.nz/book/the-mayors-flash-new-clothes
Out the mouths of “wee nippers.“
The overseas models are purely public broadcasting (no ads) and require more input from the taxpayer.
The future is public media available via satellite (Sky platform) or online – then both could be subscription.
The TVNZ/RNZ hook up would probably come with a separation out of the non news (current affairs/documentary) content.
The right and neo libs have achieved a virtual takeover of NZ media channels including social media particularly. So the survival of RNZ is important. Many veteran staff were sacked years ago and now the Tory swine want another go. I hope the archives are secure!
Still remember when RNZ was under sinking lid (sirkey) funding. John Campbell worked there briefly on a broadcast Checkpoint, and they worked off trestle tables with no proper set-it looked like an underground bunker in some Coup D’état.
RNZ must be supported and saved, again.
The imperative for the standard to expand into an online news entity is even stronger..
I spoke with nzonair recently…and they said the funding being allocated for new media. .is mainly for expansions of current platforms. .
And that applying for funding backed by an existing platform…would be viewed more favourably…
So ..the platform is here…the need is clearly here…and now the needed funding is up for grabs…$17 million..
You'd hafta ask:…why not …?
IMHO…
Bit we might have to behave if the standard gets seymours money
The next funding round is in August..
Details on the nzonair website..
Straight out of the Fascist playbook.
The parallels with Trump, Orban and Putin are even more apparent.
If the cut is met by near silence from Kiwis, doesn't that justify the cut? Should taxpayers be funding something they don't care about?
That's the tyranny of the majority.
Public broadcasting has an important role in speaking to and for the disadvantaged and minorities and supporting culture, arts and heritage. It shouldn't be burdened by the profit driven demands of private media.
But are those disadvanted groups even complaining to much of an extent? Taken together, the groups you describe likely make up a sufficient proportion of the population to justify a commercial station if they actually could be bothered listening to it.
Otherwise, aren't you being a little bit "nanny stateish" by asserting that these groups need what RNZ has to offer even if they aren't interested?
But, if we were to conduct a survey asking whether RNZ should be defunded by $20m and the savings to go into the health budget, I wonder what the survey results would be?
Briscoes is having a sale on hip replacements.
How much off?
A bit I reckon.
https://ioandc.com/how-the-wealthy-are-rewriting-private-capital-investing-rules/
Why stop at $20m? Think of all those opportunities for private capital to grow Grow GROW its profits, in the media, in education, in housing, in energy and transport infrastructure, in data storage – and, of course, in the healthcare industry.
Shrink that pesky government!
Water water everywhere…
I think the big issue with entities like RNZ being publicly funded is that they can put out whatever crap they want with the belief that they are meeting what they think their audience should need. But, I think that just leads to arrogance and a lack of accountability.
At least with a privately funded model, if a radio station or whatever isn't meeting the needs of it's customers it will go broke. That is the way it should be IMO.
If people don't care about RNZ being defunded, it just says to me that people think it has become irrelevant, suggesting they are not providing a message that people want to hear.
Like….our increasingly RW Million/Billionaire owned/subsidised media ?
Sure, if there was truly a level playing field RNZ et al would be fine. Absolutely not while your RW influencers are changing the pitch.
I think “arrogance and a lack of accountability” is more applicable to the billionaire class. Just heard some 'crap' on RNZ's 3 pm news about "recent extreme weather" – who wants to hear that? It's just a little 'wild' weather.
If you believe RNZ reports "whatever crap they want" then I can't help you.
I prefer RNZ to crapfests like Counterspin Media and the Centrist.
https://centrist.nz/?s=climate
https://centrist.nz/?s=warming
That’s a veritable smorgasbord of crappy articles peddling climate change doubt – so who founded the Centrist?
Hmm, a billionaire with business interests in fossil fuels.
I care about RNZ being defunded, but that's not what you want to hear.
Or TSmithfield, we could ask for the 68 million for Health Seymour has spent on his arrogant ventures…. just saying…it is not Radio or Health, it is not a binary choice, it is a political one.
The rule is… "who is getting the money?" It appears Seymour is and is crowing about a cut to Radio NZ "to give them a message" Thanks again MT. Arrogance showing there.
By the way Commercial (to make money for paid stories) is private radio, ie Hoskins.
RNZ is Public, and tells Public interest stories, Health news, Weather news, Local and New Zealand wide news. it does not allow advertising in its charter.
So Public Money
@ Smithfield.
Why should they have to complain..?
And you talk of various groups/interests as though they are the other..
They are us…
And the not insignificant fact is that rnz is the most trusted news source…
..and they deserve that accolade…
You seem to not put any value on this cultural asset..
And it needs more money…so it can vid-up…
Good clean RNZ fun – "The thing about being on top, is that you can't be on top forever."
https://www.rnz.co.nz/video/bird-s-eye-view/video
Where..are our Left Parties on this?
I found this ?..
And of course this…
Greens…..?
Would Left parties roll back cuts? And fund RNZ….PBS ?
Some years back, there was an Action Station petition.
Anyone know of similar now? I did search….
I must admit that I'm surprised the squishy Nats went even this far. I'd shut down RNZ and TVNZ in a heartbeat but have long reconciled myself to them simply slowly dying, which they appear to be doing. As I said in 2008 on Kiwiblog in a debate about then selling TVNZ:
I've done my part when I stopped watching TV1 in 2000, TV3 in 2003 and finally quit my RNZ addiction in 2015. Haven't missed them, even as I’ve enjoyed watching the likes of Chernobyl and re-watching Breaking Bad, Justified. etc – all on streaming services of one sort or another.
The only time I do watch TVNZ is when visiting my rellies and getting the godforsaken, shallow 6pm “news”. They’re all in their mid-70’s and up, so switching on “the telly” at 6pm is habit. When they’re gone so to will TVNZ and RNZ.
As for my Gen-Z kids: "What's TV and radio"? They don't trust journalists and as a couple said to me recently, they find the collective fact-checkers of "Community Notes" on Twitter to be better at the job.
RNZ was doing a good job of accurate reporting and holding the Coalition of Cockups Government to account.
Which is why the current Coalition of Cockups is determined to gut them.
Why They Hate Education – Robert Reich
Or. When it is publically funded. Defund and stack the board with "useful idiots".
To be on CN one has to be an American.
Who taught your children not to trust journalists, but trust the sort of person left inhabiting X?
One good thing about GOP politicians they do state their prejudice is the motive for silencing public media
because it is liberalbecause it spreads radical, woke propagandaThey are out and proud.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pbs-npr-cuts-states-won-by-trump/
Of course real democracies will continue with public broadcasting.
Rnz is so needed..
The latest example is today..
Their news bulletins are reporting that even the smallest amount of bacon/processed meats ups yr odds for bowel cancer…
'would you like some bacon with that colonoscopy..?'
Underfunding another Public News Service, so other platforms can be infiltrated by disinformation and political spin. Facebook X You Tube Tick Tock. imo
We are in Aldous Huxley's World
Quote
"Parodies and Caricatures are the most effective criticism."
The left should use that advice. Attack this arrogant lot through their egos.
Despite my comments above, I do think there is a place for government funding in the media. But, if it was me, I would provide funding for top quality investigative journalism that seems to have fallen victim to the endless churning of banal reality TV shows. The loss of the likes of Sunday was a major blow IMO.
Then the funding isn't linked to a specific organisation but rather something of value that is currently largely missing in our media landscape.
Media organisations could then pick up the productions at a very reasonable cost that would make it viable to air the content.
NZ made reality TV shows have suffered similarly to NZ investigative journalism under the changing funding model. It because contestable to a wider range of producers and the quality may have been diluted with smaller amounts of money available for too many projects. The more fragmented the industry becomes the fewer premium shows get produced.
What you are unhappy about is the screening of offshore reality TV shows which are relatively cheap to buy and require no public funding. Net result, a loss of NZ stories, imo.
I looked at PBS funding and it's along the lines of your suggestion. Funded by a public organisation (and donations) and subscribed to by media organisation for low cost in the form of dues.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PBS
Yeah, I watch some of the PBS stuff now on youtube. I didn't realise the background of it until you pointed it out. Anything that displaces the reality tv crap and puts something decent on in its place.