Yes Virginia, the Government must take some blame

Rick Neville writes at Stuff:

Like many people, I felt sick when I heard the news Bauer NZ is shutting down its publishing operations in this country.

Surely it’s just for the lockdown, I hoped when first told. But no, it’s for good.

Bauer, a German publisher which bought the business some years ago from Australasian publisher ACP, has put out serious titles including NZ Listener, Metro and North & South, and longtime family favourites Woman’s Day and Women’s Weekly. They also own Property Press, the biggest real estate publisher in New Zealand.

Then my sorrow turned to anger. Anger that the Government had not included magazines along with newspapers as an essential service. And anger because of the hypocrisy in the Government’s backflip to save the RNZ Concert Programme yet see a far more valuable contributor to New Zealand’s social, cultural and political fabric go to the wall.

Rick Neville is the editorial director of the Newspaper Publishers Association and an industry veteran.

He is right to be angry that the Government banned magazines from continuing, with a daft distinction that newspapers were essential but not magazines.

Magazines should have been included with other publications as an essential service. Subscribers receive them in the post and most other copies are bought through supermarkets, no different from the wide array of other goods freely available on supermarket shelves.

The staff are working from home, printing and distribution is highly automated, and so there is virtually no public health risk. 

Vast overkill from the Government.

The Government has said the wage subsidy was offered to Bauer but rejected, and the Prime Minister has intimated Covid-19 was the excuse the company was looking for to close.

The only explanation I can think of is that such is the fall-off in advertising and circulation revenue caused by the lockdown, the wage subsidy would have met only a small proportion of the shortfall.

The Government’s line is spin.First of all the income for the magazines would be zero because the Government had banned them.

The wage subsidy would cover a small proportion of staff wages which in itself is only a small proportion of total costs of producing magazines.