Media Statement

Hon Peter Dunne
MP for Ohariu
Leader of UnitedFuture

Thursday, 7 April 2011

Dunne: demise of NZPA, TVNZ7 sad day for New Zealand

Ohariu MP and UnitedFuture leader Peter Dunne says New Zealanders should be deeply concerned by the pending closures of both the New Zealand Press Association (NZPA) and TVNZ7.

“Yesterday was a truly sad day for New Zealand’s media and the people they purport to serve,” Mr Dunne said.

He said Fairfax’s coverage of NZPA’s demise was so partisan and self-justifying that it illustrated precisely why New Zealanders should be concerned at the departure of an independent news source.

“I thought Fairfax’s attempts at spinning what is nothing more or less than a commercial decision to withdraw backing from NZPA was simply appalling.

“It demonstrates precisely why one cannot have confidence in them as arbiters of news and how it is presented.

“It is one thing to make the decision to pull the plug on NZPA, but it is entirely another to dress it up as a positive development for readers, and even worse, to then simply turn it into an opportunity to blatantly plug their commercial news products.

“The bottom line is that fewer media can never be a good thing for a country, no matter what spin Fairfax executives want to put on it.

“The reality is that NZPA operated without egos and agendas and just got on with providing the news of the day to media outlets the length and breadth of New Zealand.

“The end of their fact-based and broad coverage of events and politics in New Zealand is a real loss, and will put New Zealanders into even greater dependence on organisations such as Fairfax,” Mr Dunne said.

When you get a media commentator of the calibre of former New Zealand Herald editor Gavin Ellis saying that the demise of NZPA will leave a gap in New Zealand journalism, then you are far closer to the unspun truth.

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