The Radio NZ funding beatup
My God, what a band of precious wee souls there are when it comes to Radio NZ. The country is recovering from a massive recession, and the Government is borrowing $240 million a week just to pay the bills. So not surprisingly, Radio NZ has been told they have to live within their budget and won’t get more money.
A former Labour Party press secretary sets up a Facebook group to Save Radio NZ and 3,000 lemmings rush to join up. You would think the Government was planning to close it down, rather than merely telling it to live within its budget.
Of course Radio NZ would like more money. So would every state agency and business in NZ, and every household. Businesses all over NZ have had to endure a reduction in revenue over the last two years. Many of them would love to have had their funding guaranteed to not decrease, as Radio NZ has.
The tens of thousands of households who have had someone lose their job, know how hard it is to cope with a drastic reduction in income. They also would love to have a guaranteed non decreasing income.
The rest of the state sector have been told that there are no increases for general operational expenses for some years to come. Many of them have admirably managed to come up with plans to reduce costs, but not outputs.
Adding to the hysteria, we have this quote:
Ms King said it would be like living in a Third World country if National Radio had to shut down between midnight and 6am.
What effing elitist nonsense. Go jump on a plane to Haiti and tell them how NZ empathises with their situation, as gasp horror we may not be able to listen to a Radio NZ host at 4 am in the morning.
As I have said before, I am a fan of National Radio. I am glad the Government has not cut its funding. But while the Government is having to borrow $240 million a week just to pay the bills, I am damn sure not going to advocate that Radio NZ be getting a funding increase. Radio NZ is part of New Zealand. We just lost $50 billion in a recession. That means there is less money for everyone, and they can damn well play their part by living within their budget.