Further collaboration with the ACCC regarding the Mandatory News Media Bargaining Code

On 20 April 2020, the Australian Government announced it had directed the ACCC to develop a mandatory code of conduct to address bargaining power imbalances between Australian news media businesses and Google and Facebook. 

The CBAA and First Nations Media Australia (FNMA) made a joint submission to the ACCC’s Concepts Paper on a Mandatory News Media Bargaining Code in July.

Following this, FNMA and the CBAA participated in consultations with the ACCC and the Public Interest Journalism Initiative about the Code to ensure community broadcasters' interests were recognised.

In August, the CBAA and FNMA made a follow up submission regarding the draft legislation.

Our key priorities in engaging with this process are to ensure that:

• Community broadcasters are recognised in the Code as not-for-profit media organisations, and that the sector's Community Radio Broadcasting Codes of Practices and Community TV Codes of Practices (as registered by the ACMA) are included under the ‘Professional Standards’ test.
• Community broadcasters are able to collectively bargain with Google and Facebook, if they so wish – either represented by their peak body or by a collection agency.
• Fair remuneration is distributed for news content across diverse organisational models.

You can read the follow up submission on our website.

For any questions, please don't hesitate to contact Holly Friedlander Liddicoat ([email protected]) in the first instance.