The unity between
Australia’s media owners to change the country’s media laws has
cracked. Crikey understands that bickering between media companies has
almost certainly removed the chances of the federal government
introducing a new liberalised media regime this year.

Both the
prime minister John Howard and his communications minister Helen Coonan
have consistently told media companies that they need to agree among
themselves on the broad direction of changes, otherwise the government
wouldn’t bother incurring the angst of reforming the laws. Senator
Coonan told ABC TV’s Inside Business
recently that “if they can get on the page with some of the directions
that the government is taking, I will then look at developing the
policy responses along the lines that I think will work.

Crikey
understands that most of the middle-ranked media owners – except
Fairfax – are now lining up against the Murdoch and Packer forces to
resist changes they now believe will only benefit the two biggest
players in the game.

Several media companies are incensed at comments
made last week by the CEO of APN News & Media, Brendan Hopkins,
advocating a “two out of three” media rule which would mean media
companies could own two out of TV, radio or newspapers in a single
market – compared to the current rule of one out of three.

The
reasons the rest of the industry is furious with Hopkins is that they
want a three-out-of-three rule, and believe Hopkins has broken the
industry consensus being presented to the government.

Crikey
understands that Kerry Stokes, the media owner closest to the prime
minister, has cooled in his support for the law changes because he
realises there would be nothing in it for his Seven Network, which
doesn’t have the balance sheet at present to allow it to participate in
the buying opportunities that would result from any major changes to
the regulatory regime.

And other mid-sized media companies like
APN, Rural Press and Southern Cross Broadcasting are believed to feel
that there’s nothing in the changes for them – other than being gobbled
up – and everything in it for News Limited and PBL.

The other
looming problem for the government in changing the media laws is
political, with National Party and regional Liberal Party members now
expressing serious reservations about the impact of a law change on
rural Australia, which is already dominated by a handful of owners.

Under proposed changes there would almost certainly be fewer media
owners – despite the government’s rhetoric about diversity – and this
could make life even harder for regional MPs. And in the wake of the
current Telstra debate, the government knows how hard it is to ram
through policies that have an adverse affect in the bush.

Compounding things even further is the massive court case between the
Seven Network and the Foxtel partners which is due to start next month
– a case that could last six months and could rip apart any sense of
unity between media owners.

As one owner summed it up recently: “The minister is all over the place and everyone is going in a different direction.”