Maori TV may lose ads for edge in World Cup

Jim Mather, chief executive of Maori Television. Photo / Dean Purcell

Maori Television may run advertising-free coverage of the Rugby World Cup games to woo viewers from its rival commercial broadcasters.

Chief executive Jim Mather yesterday said being advertising free could be the channel's "point of difference" with TVNZ and TV3 in the Government-ordered compromise he called as complicated as a Rubik's cube.

Maori TV is almost entirely state-funded, giving it a major advantage over TVNZ and TV3, which will need to cash in on advertising as much as possible to recoup what they pay for the rights.

The pressure to cram in as much advertising as possible was illustrated at the last World Cup in France, when TV3 broke the law against showing adverts on Sunday mornings in a bid to help recoup the millions it spent.

Maori TV will no longer have access to the $3 million that the Ministry of Maori Development, Te Puni Kokiri, was going to give it for the bid, although it will not have to pay as much now it is sharing with the others.

But the broadcaster is likely to have up to $3 million of its own cash in reserve to cover the costs of its coverage as its accounts show a $2.9 million profit for the year ended June 2008, and a $200,000 one this year.

As it is a statutory corporation, there is no expectation for Maori TV to pay any of this back to the Government - unlike TVNZ, which is required to pay a dividend.

Mr Mather told Parliament's Maori affairs select committee he was disappointed at the political interference that led to Maori TV having to share the rights.

He said negotiations went from being simple, to a "Rubik's cube" of different interests with the broadcasters, politicians and International Rugby Board all involved.

Mr Mather said his dealings with the IRB led him to believe they would have been more comfortable with a single channel bidding for the free-to-air rights.

He said Sky, which has won the pay television rights, was also disappointed at the shared rights - which will see the rugby on up to six free-to-air channels at once - because it "diluted" what it initially purchased.