RNZ job cuts: ‘Our staff and the public deserve better’

The general public broadcaster is dealing with sweeping task cuts after shock discoveries the business lost almost $12 million dollars, with strategies to axe the equivalent of almost 60 full-time tasks.

President Paul Thompson stated internal reports provided an unreliable photo of the financial resources, and management just learnt about the size of the loss in October.

RNZ likewise broke the law by establishing a $5 million overdraft without approval from ministers and the board is commissioning an independent evaluation to learn what failed.

E tū – the union for media employees – stated RNZ personnel had actually currently been through voluntary rounds of redundancies and as an outcome lots of groups were running short as individuals who left were not changed.

It stated 18 individuals had actually picked to leave.

“Our workforce is already feeling significant pressure from job losses and the loss of so many more jobs will make it even harder for us to meet the needs of New Zealanders and provide the stories that need to be told,” Auckland-based RNZ reporter and E tū delegate Melanie Earley stated.

“Our staff and the public deserve better,” she stated.

E tū director Amy Hansen stated the nation did not yet understand who the next broadcasting minister would be, and RNZ had sufficient cash in reserve to survive this year.

“There’s no need to rush,” she stated.

“This government has cut RNZ’s funding two years running and signalled more cuts to come. Decisions about RNZ’s future shouldn’t be made while the country waits for a government.

“Get the evaluation done, discover what failed, and hold back on cutting tasks up until there’s a federal government in location to make choices about public media.

“New Zealanders trust RNZ more than any other news outlet. That trust was built by the people who work there. Don’t make them pay for someone else’s mistakes.”

Cuts will ‘affect the quality of the item’ – analyst

Media analyst and Newsroom site co-founder Mark Jennings informed Checkpoint that the discoveries from RNZ on Monday were a “complete shocker”

He stated he anticipated brand-new RNZ chair Brent Impey to be “absolutely furious” over the news, which it was difficult to fathom how the executive and senior management were captured out by the monetary shortage.

Jennings stated both personnel spirits and the item itself would suffer under the proposed cuts, with a “decent chunk” of the cuts undoubtedly originating from the news operations.

“Chopping that many people out of a newsroom will really impact the quality of the product.

“I believe that at a time when the entire media is withdrawing and great deals of individuals have actually aimed to RNZ as sort of a safeguard around that, that’s going to have a significant effect when they begin whittling individuals out of the newsroom.”

With Thompson already leaving at the end of this year and former chief financial officer Hilary Parker resigning unexpectedly in early October, Jennings said he expected other executives would be following them out the door.

Jennings said he was not sure why an independent review was even needed.

“Brent might go and discover precisely what’s gone on within a couple of minutes, truly. I simply believe that’s another type of expense that RNZ does not truly require.”

He said he was puzzled by the silence from the rest of the finance team.

“It’s not simply one CFO who has access to the financial resources, in an organisation of the size of RNZ, there would be 4 or 5 – or perhaps more – financing individuals, what were they doing, were they simply sitting peaceful?

“What is it, that people don’t speak up when they’re scared?”