Under ABC television’s proposed new current affairs and news regime, the people of the ACT will continue to get four cents a day’s worth while everyone else in Australia is getting the full eight cents. We get good radio, but ABC television’s service is a disgrace.
It was announced this week that the 7.30 Report would go national with input from all states and the Northern Territory and that each state and the Northern Territory would get a new weekly current affairs program. There would be three new regional offices.
Unlike every other state and territory, the ACT is not to have its own television new or current affairs. It is not good enough. The ABC should realise that Canberra is not just the House on the Hill or a suburb of Sydney. It has its own elected government which affects the lives of people who live here and in the immediate region just as profoundly as the Tasmanian or Northern Territory Governments affect the lives of their citizens. That many people in Canberra are dissatisfied with the system of ACT government is the more reason for a stronger media presence.
That the ABC is to open and or increase television coverage in Darwin, Launceston, the north-west and northern Australia while ignoring the more populous and jurisdictionally distinct ACT is unworthy of the national broadcaster. The ABC should have a separate television presence in the ACT. Viewers here do not want the piped material from Sydney much of which has no relevance to their lives.