The ministerial announcement this week, outlining ongoing funding for the ABC, was clearly pitched to convince voters of a ‘strong government commitment’ to supporting the national broadcaster. But as Alumni director Quentin Dempster explains, it’s more spin than substance. The Minister’s budget 'increase' is tiny when compared to more than half a billion dollars that's been cut from the ABC’s budget over the last eight years, rising to around $700 million when defunding of the ABC’s crucial international service is taken into account.

Around the world, growing government hostility is threatening independent media who do their job, ask tough questions, and hold the powerful to account. Here Alan Sunderland explains why the recent UK government’s announcement to freeze the BBC licence fee for the next two years, and potentially eradicate it, is about a lot more than funding models and has worrying parallels with what has been happening to the ABC for several years. 

The future of the ABC has been occupying the minds of politicians of all persuasions recently, for a variety of reasons. But with the welcome news that the ALP will introduce a five-year funding model and restore indexation if it wins office in 2022, is the national broadcaster becoming a major election issue or a political football? Greg Wilesmith reports.

The ABC has just released its 2020-2021 annual report. The public broadcaster’s achievements during this period have been many, from outstanding emergency reporting on bushfires, floods and the COVID-19 pandemic to innovative programming that has been lauded both nationally and internationally. But, as Quentin Dempster reports, funding uncertainty continues to stymie the ABC’s future.  

The year’s first major public rally in support of the ABC was held in federal treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s Kooyong electorate in Melbourne on Saturday night, 8 May. Organised by ABC Friends Victoria, the well attended fundraiser heard from speakers including the MEAA’s vice president and former ABC journalist Karen Percy, and former ABC journalist Jim Middleton representing ABC Alumni. Our Victorian convenor Peter Marks, who assisted the event’s organisers, reports on the night’s proceedings.

Quentin Dempster discusses potential risks of the ABC entering into precedent-setting commercial relationships with online providers. Will it, he asks, make it easier for any hostile future federal government to demand more commerciality, not less, and soften up the ABC for partial or whole privatisation?

The ABC is rightly proud of the profound trust from audiences evident through the bushfire and pandemic national emergencies, but its paymaster, the Morrison government, has not responded to ABC Board pleas for respite from defunding. In this comprehensive article, Quentin Dempster discusses the fallout from ongoing staff and program losses, and serious challenges still facing the public broadcaster.