Michael Danby (Melbourne Ports, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

These changes that the government has proposed to the Communications Legislation Amendment (SBS Advertising Flexibility and Other Measures) Bill 2015 are not in the spirit of the original founders of SBS. I knew some of the people who were originally behind the formation of both SBS radio and SBS TV. They very much had an ethos of speaking to multicultural Australia, of ensuring that views that were not represented in the commercial media were spoken for and expressed

These days, SBS does a very good job in some ways in doing that. We all enjoyed their populist venture into Eurovision. I know they had a big audience.

I think there are some aspects of the programming under the current management that have been excellent and, indeed, an improvement on some of the more ideological programs of the past. But turning SBS into another commercial network—as Harold Mitchell, FECCA and other people who are fair-minded thinkers have said—is not in the interests of Australian broadcasting in the long term. It is not in the interests of a pluralist Australia. Notwithstanding the criticisms made of that program Struggle Street, I think the government continuing to support a network that is differentiated from both what one academic friend of mine used to call the 'Anglo zone' on the ABC and the rather banal—and increasingly banal—presentations of the commercial networks is something well worth doing. I believe my colleague has now arrived. I am happy to cede the floor to her.

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