Abstract
This chapter examines the transparency and funding of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC). The organisation is Australia’s only wholly state-owned and -funded public service media body. It provides television, radio, online and mobile services, as well as publishing and licensing, live event and international development services, in Australia and overseas. The ABC has faced numerous struggles over time, including accusations of bias and suggestions that it has threatened Australia’s media plurality. It has also endured multiple cuts to its budget, mainly by conservative governments. These have significantly impacted the organisation’s operations and the content that it produces. A recent federal review also criticised the ABC’s transparency, targeting its strategic plan and breakdown of its costs in particular. This chapter outlines how the organisation has begun to respond to these latest criticisms, and how it has faced other challenges. It also details the broadcaster’s ongoing fight to achieve budgetary efficiency and ensure transparency. Ultimately, despite the ongoing setbacks that the organisation has faced, it continues its push to thrive and survive; it remains the perpetual battler.
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Notes
- 1.
The ABC’s sister organisation—the Special Broadcasting Service (SBS), which provides multicultural and multilingual content—is hybrid-funded, deriving around 80% of its budget from the Australian government and the remainder from its commercial activities, which include advertising and sponsorship, and the sale of goods and services (SBS n. d.). In light of the SBS’s hybrid-funded nature, this chapter focuses on the ABC only.
- 2.
In the following, $ always refers to Australian Dollars (AUD).
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Swiatek, L., Brevini, B. (2018). Australia: The Perpetual Battler. In: Herzog, C., Hilker, H., Novy, L., Torun, O. (eds) Transparency and Funding of Public Service Media – Die deutsche Debatte im internationalen Kontext. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-17997-7_11
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