Receivership for Mediaworks

Stuff reports:

Presenters and staff at embattled MediaWorks will keep their jobs following receivers being appointed to the company, but the taxpayer – potentially owed tens of millions of dollars – will be the big loser.

At a press conference this morning receivers Brendan Gibson and Michael Stiassny of KordaMentha said they had been appointed by MediaWorks’ senior lenders to manage a transition in ownership.

Gibson said senior lenders – owed around $400m – were forming a new company and intended to retain all current staff.

“All the 1400 employees will keep their jobs. We’ll be moving to transfer their contracts at an appropriate time,” Gibson said.

Contracts and payments to suppliers would also be met, and current broadcast programming would be unaffected, the receivers said.

For now, no job losses. But hard to think there will not be some down the road as the receivers cut costs to the bone.

The fate of Mediaworks is perhaps a good comparative lesson for non-commercial broadcasters that are taxpayer funded. They’ve been whining about a funding freeze, while their commercial counterparts would sell their right arm to be able to have stable revenue.