What free-to-air TV will look like come July 6

Thursday, 11 April 2024

Yesterday, April 10, 2024, a total of ten local news and current affairs programmes aired across Aotearoa’s free-to-air TV stations. By the end of this week, there will have been 67 individual news, current and consumer affairs transmissions inside seven days.

But April 10 was also the day we learned the extent of the cuts at TVNZ and Newshub. Come July 6 - just eight weeks from now - we’ll be down to just three news shows per weekday on one broadcaster, 31 each week.

So what will free-to-air TV actually look like in three months’ time? Something like this.

Wait, we have 67 news shows - really?

67 individual broadcasts per week, not counting reruns.

The count on that is on TVNZ Breakfast (5), Midday (5), Tonight (5), Seven Sharp (5), 1 News (7), Fair Go (1) Q&A (1), Te Karere (5) and Sunday (1); on Three AM (5), Newshub Live at 6pm (7), Newshub Late (5), and The Hui (1); on Whakaata Māori Te Ao Mārama (5), Te Ao with Moana (1) and Marae (1) and on Sky Open, News First (7).

Newshub’s final broadcasts will go out on July 5, leaving many gaps to fill.

And what will be left?

TVNZ and Whakaata Māori will own all the locally-produced news and current affairs programming after July 5, when Newshub’s shows sign off for the final time, with the exception of The Hui.

That show - which livestreams on ThreeNow and airs on both Three and Whakaata Māori later in the week - has NZ On Air funding secured through to the end of 2024 and Newshub’s owner Warner Bros Discovery NZ said it would continue to provide studio support to The Hui until then.

A standard weekday will now have just four news shows, three on TVNZ 1 - Breakfast, Te Karere and 1 News and Te Ao Mārama on Whakaata Māori.

Julian Wilcox, presenter of The Hui. The show will be the only current affairs and news show on Three.

That takes our weekly count to Breakfast (5), Seven Sharp (5), 1 News (7), Q&A (1), Te Karere (5), Te Ao Mārama (5), Te Ao With Moana (1) and Marae (1), plus The Hui.

How will the broadcasters fill all those gaps?

Neither has addressed this but we can say with a degree of certainty that it will be with foreign programming.

This degree of certainty rises from both TVNZ’s and WBD’s reasons for slashing their news and current affairs programming in the first place: local programming is expensive to produce, much, much more expensive than buying what’s known as “finished” shows from overseas.

Could some of the programming that replaces these local shows be foreign news and current affairs - a US current affairs show, say, to replace Sunday, a UK consumer affairs show to replace Fair Go? Possibly, and it probably wouldn’t be a bad idea, considering those shows are among TVNZ’s top performers.

If advertising cuts come from non-news TV, Shortland Street could be under the axe.

TVNZ and WBD might pop some of the non-news NZ programming they do commission each year into these now-free time slots, particularly in prime time. Maybe a 10-part local reality series would go well aired at 6pm on Three every night for two weeks, for example, while Fair Go’s Monday night spot lends itself to a factual series.

But dollars to doughnuts, the broadcasters will not be ordering anything new. Too expensive.

Why aren’t they cancelling drama, comedy and reality shows instead, then?

They absolutely might, down the line.

Most of the original programming on TVNZ and Three’s 2024 slates is already paid for and well on its way to being fully produced, if not already delivered. So, no need to panic - MAFS NZ is definitely happening in 2024.

Next year, however, could be a different story and Spada, the body that presents Kiwi film and TV producers, is seriously concerned that the drop in advertising revenue that prompted the news cuts will come for entertainment shows next.

Particularly at risk will be the mainly unscripted programmes - reality, game, cooking, home renovations - that are largely advertising-funded. Shortland Street also falls into this category.

NZ On Air funding might help shield some of these shows, though with that organisation facing the Government’s public sector cuts, it’s no guarantee.

Scripted shows that have international co-funding have another lifeline, but local broadcasters still need to put some money into these shows.

So while TV in July 2024 will already look markedly different, by 2025 it could be even less recognisable.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story left out Te Karere, TVNZ’s daily te reo broadcast, and Whakaata Māori’s programming. This has been updated. (Amended: April 11, 2024, 10.47am.)