Media Insider: Top cop on the axing of Police Ten 7; TVNZ layoffs – should the public still own a commercial broadcaster?

As TVNZ staff are called into meetings about their future today, a former host opens up about his own show’s axing; TVNZ layoffs spark questions over ownership; Newshub’s redundancy offers revealed – but where was
the Nation show? Media lawyers swap sides; Weather wars – top agency may move to Aussie.

The top police officer who fronted the Police Ten 7 crimefighting show on TVNZ has retired from the force after 28 years and spoken out for the first time about his disappointment over the way the top-rating show was taken off our screens.

Detective Senior Sergeant Rob Lemoto, who fronted Police Ten 7 for almost a decade, always had a softer screen persona than his predecessor, retired Detective Inspector Graham Bell, who was renowned for labelling criminals as “morons”, “scumbags”, “murderous thugs”, “mindless lowlifes” and “gutless goons”, among many other colourful descriptors.

But Lemoto was no less disappointed than Bell when the show was pulled from TVNZ amid allegations that it perpetrated racial stereotypes in that non-European people were over-represented when it came to arrests.

Lemoto, speaking for the first time publicly about Ten 7′s axing, said when producers asked him for his feedback on claims the show was racist, he was “dumbfounded” and “disappointed”.

“I was like ‘Are you kidding me?’” Lemoto told Media Insider.

“I think one of the comments made was that there needs to be more white people on the show. Well, is that in itself not racist? Okay, so do we script it so that we only show European offenders? Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that there aren’t any but when the cameras go out with a car, it was predominantly in Auckland because that obviously helped keep the cost down.

“The cameras were only attached to cars and the cars only go to areas where there’s work.

“It’s a reality show, it’s not scripted and what you see is what the team has experienced.”

Police Ten 7 – renamed Ten 7 Aotearoa in its final season – finished in 2023 after 21 years and 29 seasons on our screens. While it remained one of New Zealand’s most popular television shows – and a successful export to Australia – it had been subject to critical media commentary, political heat and major academic research.

Many critics argued that it emphasised negative cultural stereotypes and marginalised specific communities.

Lemoto – who has retired from the police force after 28 years – said the show always needed an entertainment factor, but it was also a critical tool to solve crimes.

“You’re never going to put it on television if it’s just policing – ‘look we’d love to find this person’, ‘do your civic duty’, and ‘say no to drugs’,” he says.

“We have a bit of a toolkit and Ten 7 for me was definitely in that toolkit and gave us an opportunity to get some stuff out there to get some help from the public.

“We had cases that we would have just been closing and filing. It was the last avenue of hope for the victims. When we put it on the show, we’d get a lead, find the offender and get some closure for the victims.”

Lemoto said it was a privilege and honour to host the show. Bell had built a huge following and Lemoto said he had big shoes to fill: “I am only size 11!”

By the same token, he readily acknowledges his persona was different.

As a fulltime cop, Lemoto still had a day job beyond his television appearances.

“I’m still giving evidence in front of High Court judges, so I can’t call [offenders] mongrels or fat losers.”

Bell was from a different policing era, he said, where officers smoked cigars and drank whisky. “I don’t even drink tea or coffee.”

Don’t let appearances deceive, however. Lemoto is retiring after almost three decades in the force, dealing with some of the worst elements of society. There have still been times when he’s dragged criminals to a police car, or dealt assertively with gang members.

“I’ll always go with my hand out, to shake someone’s hand, and talk to them. But there are times when you just have to be assertive.”

Lemoto says what’s most disappointing is that TVNZ is now showing only Australian police and highway traffic reality shows. They offered nothing in terms of helping Kiwi victims “so that is a little bit hard to take on the chin”.

“I’m old, and I’m fast approaching 50, so I still watch television. I turn it on and there’s the Australian police force or something. How many victims from New Zealand communities is that helping?”

Lemoto’s comments follow similar sentiment from Bell last year.

“Wokeness and political correctness have just killed it in the end,” Bell told Media Insider of Ten 7. “You can’t hide from reality.”

The “allegation” that Māori and Pasifika communities were a focus was “nonsense”, said Bell.

“All it focused on was the people who were committing crimes or getting into trouble with the police from day to day. The police have never picked the colour of the people they deal with.”

In an interview with the police Ten One magazine, Lemoto said he looked back on his career with pride.

“I’m proud of what we do. I always have been. When I joined, I just wanted to chase bad people and drive Holdens. I didn’t know what policing really was.”

As the magazine reported, he is now an “empty-nester” but looking to spend more time with his wife and young adult daughters.

“If I don’t do it now, I’ll never do it. In policing you work pretty hard, but you do it for the right reasons. It’s been a hell of a ride and it’s pretty hard not to get emotional about it. I’m really proud of what I have achieved.”

TVNZ layoffs pose bigger ownership questions

TVNZ will today meet staff directly affected by proposals that will see the state broadcaster cut almost 70 roles.

Journalists and workers from Sunday, Fair Go, Tonight and Re:News are among those who have been called into meetings today. About 35 of the proposed 68 job losses are understood to be in the news and current affairs division.

It has been a brutal two days for TVNZ staff – firstly with news of the job cuts being leaked to media on Wednesday and then an awful day yesterday as individuals waited to see if they would receive an email invitation to a meeting today.

One source told Media Insider that many in the newsroom were in revolt over the way the process had been handled, especially as other media started receiving details.

A deeper question is simmering away in the background – the future ownership and shape of TVNZ.

Former Prime Minister Helen Clark believes more public funding of TVNZ is required – as a state-owned enterprise, TVNZ is essentially a wholly commercial operation which receives a small amount of public funding, through NZ on Air, for some programmes.

Clark was no big fan of the earlier, proposed RNZ-TVNZ merger but suggests that might need to be considered again.

“It just needs some lateral thinking on a non-partisan basis around how do we keep free-to-air news and current affairs in New Zealand,” Clark told Newstalk ZB last night.

On the other side of the political spectrum, however, many wonder why the Government still owns a commercial television station.

While TVNZ has been clear its cost-cutting and restructuring plans have been in response to the rapid audience shifts to digital – and a dramatic drop in traditional advertising revenue – some media industry insiders believe the company is a future candidate for privatisation.

After all, is there any reason the Government should own two media companies, especially if RNZ is given more scope and resource to move into video news?

One future option could be selling TVNZ as a commercial business, and having in place legislative requirements that require a certain level of local programming including, say, two hours of news and current affairs – through the day with a digital focus – delivered by an overhauled and beefed up RNZ news and current affairs division.

RNZ, under a new name and with boosted skillsets and personnel from TVNZ, becomes the sole public broadcaster.

Associate Finance Minister David Seymour has asked the Treasury to compile an analysis of TVNZ’s financial performance in light of the pending closure of Newshub.

Treasury said last night it expected to provide this in the next fortnight.

It said there was no work planned or being carried out on TVNZ’s possible future ownership.

But a spokesman added: “As outlined in the Treasury’s Briefing to Incoming Shareholding and Responsible Ministers, we would like to engage with shareholding ministers on the development of an ownership policy statement and individual company and entity ownership purpose statements (including for TVNZ) to confirm the Crown’s purposes for its interest in individual companies and entities.

“Determining the Crown’s purposes for owning companies and entities provides direction for the application of legislative and other levers and for companies’ and entities’ engagement with shareholding ministers on achieving these purposes.”

Seymour is shareholding minister for TVNZ. He’s also leader of Act, which has long pushed for SOEs like TVNZ to be sold.

“You’ve got to distinguish between ACT’s policies that I advocate as the leader and policies that the Government signed up to,” Seymour told Media Insider last night.

“The Government right now has no plans to change the ownership of any SOE nor is it investigating them. There’s been no discussion about that at a Cabinet level.

“We will, of course, be starting to ask the question around, ‘Why do we own these things? And what do we get for owning them?’ Again, that’s a prudent question …

“If you’re asking me separately what’s Act policy, we went into the election with an alternative budget that basically said every SOE should be either sold or put into the mixed ownership model.

“And I think the advantage of having private investors with their own money scrutinising the performance of a company is enormous.

“I mean, it probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to get 5 per cent of every SOE just to get another set of eyes on it. I think in reality it needs to be more than that. So Act, as a party, struggles to see the basis for owning it but obviously, we’re part of the Government that isn’t going as far as we’d like but is going farther than we would go otherwise without Act.”

Seymour says the media landscape is shifting rapidly.

“The implications for democracy are pretty significant. You can’t have two neighbours living side by side in totally different worlds because they just have their own online reality. It’s a recipe for chaos.

“I don’t know how the Government should respond to that need. It’s possible the Government actually is not capable of improving matters. I mean, sometimes you shouldn’t just do something because you think you need to and do something that you know, is ineffective for the sake of it. I don’t think anyone’s really cracked what the role of government is in this new age.”

TVNZ CEO back in NZ

TVNZ’s 6pm news reported last night that chief executive Jodi O’Donnell was out of the country yesterday, as email invitations were sent to staff affected by the latest round of proposals.

In an all-staff email sent yesterday morning, O’Donnell explained the business pressures on TVNZ and said Friday would be a “confronting” day at the company.

“I know this is not the news any of us want to hear, and it’s certainly not a message I want to deliver, but I want to be upfront with you and ensure that you hear it from me,” she wrote.

A TVNZ spokeswoman confirmed O’Donnell was in Australia yesterday morning, meeting with broadcasters there, and returned to Auckland in the afternoon.

“She will be at TVNZ’s Auckland offices [on Friday] as consultation begins and through that process,” said the spokeswoman.

“We have longstanding partnerships with commercial broadcasters in Australia for content (i.e. Home and Away from Seven and Nine’s news reporting). We’re always looking at how we can work together more in this space. We’re also keen to learn from the success Australian broadcasters have had in achieving regulatory change in their market, but we won’t be providing specific details of these meetings.”

Newshub had funding: where was Nation?

Warner Bros. Discovery is understood to be offering relatively generous redundancy packages to staff affected by the proposed closure of Newshub.

Media Insider understands staff will be offered four weeks’ salary for every year they have worked at the broadcaster, up to a maximum of nine years. In other words, long-serving staff are set to receive up to nine months’ salary.

That will come as small consolation for journalists and broadcasters still reeling a week after the announcement that Newshub is proposed to close at the end of June.

As some staff try to pull together a rescue package themselves, background talks continue on whether any aspect of the Newshub brand can be saved. Could any other media company, for instance, offer Warner Bros. Discovery a daily package of video news for its digital and terrestrial channels (a little like Newshub gives to Sky TV now for its 5.30pm news)?

Several high-profile journalists and broadcasters are continuing to talk behind the scenes with rival media companies about their future options.

One of the intriguing questions around the closure of Newshub has been the whereabouts of Newshub Nation. It had secured about $1 million in NZ on Air funding and was meant to have been on air on Saturday, February 24, the week before the Newshub announcement.

It never started.

“WBD had communicated with us that they needed to delay their on-air date this year due to recruitment for a key role, and we were awaiting a confirmed revised date when [the closure] announcement came out,” a NZ on Air spokeswoman said.

She said no money “had gone out to WBD yet for Newshub Nation 2024″.

The key role is understood to be executive producer.

Newshub Nation was co-hosted by Rebecca Wright and Simon Shepherd, although Shepherd had been named as Newshub business correspondent just a week before Warner Bros. Discovery announced the Newshub closure.

In the wake of the Newshub news, Shepherd had been considered by some to be a potential candidate to be new editor-in-chief for the National Business Review but it appears he’s not in the running.

“I received inquiries from a number of fantastic candidates for the ‘editor-in-chief of strategy’ role,” said NBR publisher Todd Scott.

“Ultimately [wife and business partner] Jackie and I have decided on a person we both have a great deal of respect for, an individual who has a lot of experience.

“We will spend a couple of days with this individual going over strategy here in Fiji later this month, following which Jackie will fly back to Auckland mid-April to make the announcement to our team.”

One Good Text

A big night ahead for One NZ chief executive Jason Paris as the One NZ Warriors kick off their 2024 NRL season.

Top Stuff names miss sport roles

Some of Stuff’s best-known sports reporters have missed out on roles within the company’s new sports structure.

Journalists Mark Reason, Dave Long, Zoe George, and Sam Wilson and news director Greg Tourelle are understood to have missed out. Some of them may yet be redeployed within the business.

“I can advise that we are still in discussion with a number of our talented sports team,” said chief executive Laura Maxwell.

Legal swapsies

They faced each other as legal counsel for Stuff and NZME. Now they’ve switched teams.

NZME’s longstanding legal counsel, Allison Whitney, joined Stuff this week as chief legal officer, at the same time as Stuff’s former legal counsel, Gen O’Halloran, joined NZME as general counsel and company secretary.

The pair are both highly respected and likely enjoying the prospect of encountering each other once again, now fighting for the companies they once came up against.

Caffeine hit

It’s been an obviously horrific fortnight for New Zealand media and even some of the “new media” are not immune from troubles.

As Media Insider reported on Wednesday, the arts media website The Pantograph Punch, established in 2010, will go into hiatus later this month following a struggle for funding to sustain its journalistic endeavour.

Meanwhile, the new Caffeine website – targeted at New Zealand’s start-up community – has also had to reshape itself after co-founder and CEO Julie Gill was diagnosed with cancer.

“At the time it knocked the wind out of us all, but we forged on,” said co-founder James Hurman in a note to the site’s readers.

“However, at the beginning of this year Julie had a severe reaction to her treatment and this forced us all to face the reality that Julie’s health and recovery was much more important than Caffeine.”

Gill had stepped back from her role, meaning there were knock-on effects given her position as commercial revenue leader, Hurman wrote.

“We had built a team reliant on that income, and needed to make the very difficult decision to slim the team down to an affordable level so that we could keep Caffeine alive while we chart a new course.”

Highly regarded editor Fiona Rotherham’s role has been disestablished as a result and she has returned to the National Business Review.

“Fiona will be continuing her excellent reporting elsewhere with our gratitude for the role she played in establishing Caffeine and our best wishes for the future,” said Hurman.

“For the next few weeks we’ll be rebasing, taking stock and finding a new path forward.

“Our irrepressible journalist, Mary Hurley, will be continuing to produce daily content for Caffeine. And although there won’t be quite so much of it, we’ll be focused on the daily updates most useful to you.”

As Media Insider reported in August, the website is targeted at New Zealand’s start-up community and entrepreneurs.

“Our mission is to be the way our community connects and shares – to accelerate Aotearoa New Zealand toward outperforming the world at creating, scaling, and exiting extraordinary start-ups. We see a future where our founders are far better connected and networked – to each other, those who can help them, and their peers around the world.”

Gill has been previously the managing director of IDG, publisher of Unlimited magazine and a general manager of Fairfax NZ’s business division. Hurman, the founding partner of Previously Unavailable, acts as director and strategic adviser.

Opinion: Media weather wars

One of the National-led Government’s first real tests of its focus on public spending and bureaucracy will be how it responds to an official review into why New Zealand persists with two publicly owned weather agencies who have little time for each other, and one of whom regularly steps on the other’s toes, posing public safety risks.

A review into MetService and Niwa, and the way they work together (or not), was expected to be completed by now but has been delayed until May.

“The weather forecasting review is progressing well and has received significant input from MetService, Niwa, and other key stakeholders,” State Owned Enterprises Minister Paul Goldsmith told Media Insider through a spokesman.

“It is expected that the weather forecasting system review report will be finalised by the end of April 2024, with advice provided to the Government after that. It would be premature of me to comment specifically on the review, or potential issues, until it is complete.”

The review – and any actions – can’t come soon enough for New Zealand’s leading private weather agency, WeatherWatch, which has grown increasingly frustrated with the landscape in New Zealand.

It is now looking to extend to Australia to build its business.

“With Newshub going, WeatherWatch will be the only private outlet with a weather broadcast in all of New Zealand,” WeatherWatch owner Philip Duncan told Media Insider.

He said his agency was up against three publicly owned broadcasters who all made commercial weather videos: Niwa, MetService and TVNZ.

WeatherWatch has to pay about $100,000 a year for New Zealand data and data hosting from overseas agencies, because Niwa tries to charge it $1 million a year for “very basic historical data that is publicly owned”, says Duncan.

“Clearly we can’t buy that – in fact, no business would. But in Australia, you pay $1000 a year – an admin fee – to access public data. In USA and Canada, it’s free to openly use.”

Duncan said he had messaged Broadcasting Minister Melissa Lee, outlining “how unfair it is to do business in New Zealand against the Government itself”.

“If this review suggests Niwa stop acting so aggressively towards MetService and the private sector, and places value on data that is tax-funded being freely open (like in Aussie, Canada, USA, UK etc) then that reduces our need to go to Australia to find more revenue, but we’re still working now to find investment to get us across the ditch so we can further expand our products back here at home.

“We have huge demand and interest from Australia due to our YouTube Channel (WeatherWatchTV) and so we’d have a quick way to market what we do there.”

WeatherWatch has also launched a new app to help fund its business.

“We are currently in talks to find more investment here in New Zealand, but it’s hard work with Niwa blocking the most basic data from us to use as solutions to clients – namely historic data, which in many cases was given to Niwa by volunteers over the years and is hugely tax-funded or publicly owned data.”

He can’t understand why any Government would continue to support two weather agencies.

“If MetService is number 1 and WW is number 2 then why does Niwa (way down the list) get so much blind and non-transparent funding? It’s like the Government is trying to keep Blockbuster video alive and we are Netflix. Just the smallest amount of support from our own Government would go a long way.”