‟most of the media here are foreign-owned”
In the reply to a comment on his new blog, Winston Peters highlights that media corporations have aims that conflict with informing the public:
Winston says: “You raise some interesting points. One of the problems is that most of the media here are foreign-owned. That means their profits are sent overseas and they cut costs to achieve maximum returns. Informing the people is not a high priority. … Media accountability is non-existent in this country. …”
The news media have a powerful voice in society. Presently that voice is too often manipulated to promote political agendas at the detriment of informing the public. For example, the news media propagated a pejorative re-naming of the Crimes (Substituted Section 59) Amendment Bill. By labelling it the “Anti-Smacking” bill, the news media favoured the position of those in opposition to the bill. Imagine how the emphasis of the debate would have changed if they had labelled it something like the “Prevention of Violence to Children” bill.
Last year, the New Zealand Herald ran a vigorous campaign against the passing of the Electoral Finance Bill. To achieve their aims the NZ Herald mis-stated facts in order to promote public opposition to the bill. In April this year, the Press Council ruled the Herald’s front-page editorial last year contained a “mis-statement of fact”, which the paper should have promptly corrected. Ironically, despite all its rabble-rousing of opposition to the bill, the Herald itself failed to make a submission on the bill to the Justice and Electoral Committee.
A top priority of TheyWorkForYou.co.nz is to inform the people of New Zealand. At present I’m brainstorming new ideas for how to do that in a better way leading up to the election. If you have ideas you’d like to share, please drop me a line:
