More bad news due in TVNZ report

Television New Zealand's annual report, due out this week, is expected to give opposition MPs another reason to force a parliamentary inquiry into the network.

A select committee investigation is already almost a certainty because of the staffing scandals at TVNZ and MPs are convinced the report will reveal a severely reduced dividend for the year ended June.

National's broadcasting spokeswoman, Georgina te Heuheu, said yesterday the worrying thing was that the dividend slumped in a period before the resignation of chief executive Ian Fraser, the row about Susan Wood's salary and other staffing problems.

In June last year TVNZ paid the Government a $37 million dividend. The report for the latest financial year is expected to show it has dropped to about a third of that.

Parliament's finance and expenditure committee and its commerce committee have both been asked by opposition MPs to hold an inquiry.

The commerce committee has a majority of non-government MPs and its chair is National's Katherine Rich, so it has a ready-made majority if an inquiry is put to a vote.

The finance and expenditure committee has higher status, and would have first call on an inquiry because TVNZ's annual report will go to it for scrutiny in the normal course of events.

Prime Minister Helen Clark, who has said she is not worried about an inquiry, indicated yesterday the finance and expenditure committee was the most likely to hold an inquiry, in which case the commerce committee would not undertake a separate one.

Select committees have strong powers of investigation, and an inquiry into TVNZ is likely to be a high profile grilling of its bosses from the board chairman down.

Mrs te Heuheu says the board should be held accountable for TVNZ's poor financial performance.

"Will the forecast drop in the dividend be reflected in the pay packets of the board?" she asked yesterday.

- NZPA