Prime slams 'exorbitant waste' of TVNZ campaign

Prime TV chief executive Chris Taylor has accused Television New Zealand of "exorbitant waste" in its battle to kill off its competitors.

Mr Taylor said TVNZ's marketing of Close Up was excessive and it was buying programmes to keep them out of the hands of other networks.

"They can argue they have to spend more because it's more competitive. But there's spending more, and then there is just being silly."

He said TVNZ was pursuing a "saturation" campaign for Close Up.

"All these dollars are being spent saturating the market on buses, radio and the press in a wasteful endeavour to snuff out competition.

"Not all of us have the luxury. Not a lot of companies in the world could afford to do that. "

He said sending Susan Wood to Rome for the Pope's funeral was another example of waste.

"There was no need for Susan to be there. Did it improve coverage?"

TVNZ head of public affairs Avon Adams defended the campaign.

"We are promoting Close Up strongly because it is a new programme with a new presenter. We are trying to establish it in a much more competitive time slot.

She said all of TVNZ's news and current affairs were funded commercially, not through the public purse.

"Regardless of who we are owned by, we are a commercial operator. TVNZ gets less than 10 per cent from the state purse."

Peter Thompson, senior lecturer in communications at Unitec, said Prime was hardly innocent of spending money on rebranding itself.

"If Paul Holmes' ratings don't pick up, that's going to be an expensive rebranding exercise," he said.

"Having said that, if TVNZ is serious about moving away from personality-driven current affairs, one might expect to see them spending more money on Charter programmes and less money on decorating the backs of buses."

Mr Taylor said TVNZ's push to secure its commercial operations was taking priority over the Charter.

Ms Adams denied Mr Taylor's claims that TVNZ bought back catalogues of programmes.

"We don't buy back programmes to freeze out the market. We do buy programme packages which are a mix of well known and lesser known programmes, which we will air."

TV3 chief executive Brent Impey said there were "serious issues relating to transparency and accessibility of funding of TVNZ".

"Unlike any of the commercial broadcasters they have the advantage of having a pot of money from the Charter and they have had a repayment of dividends."