Journos Fight IRB Policy
New Zealand media outlets have joined an international press campaign of “outrage” over the International Rugby Board’s World Cup media policy for this year’s tournament in France.
The president of the New Zealand Newspaper Publishers’ Association, Peter O’Hara, said the IRB was attempting to restrict legitimate news reporting of the World Cup.
O’Hara confirmed the NPA, whose members include the Fairfax Media and APN network of newspapers, would be supporting attempts by the World Association of Newspapers to fight the IRB’s “draconian” policy.
After previous negotiations broke down with the IRB threatening to charge newspapers to attend World Cups, the WAN yesterday sent a strongly-worded letter to the Dublin-based organisation, refusing to rule out the possibility of a legal challenge.
The WAN successfully won a similar battle last year with international soccer bosses who attempted to introduce severe restrictions on the media at last year’s World Cup in Germany, only to capitulate under threat of legal action and greatly reduced news coverage.
New Zealand media companies from print and television met with an IRB delegation headed by chief executive Michael Miller in Wellington last week but came away disheartened.
The stand-off remains, with no major New Zealand media companies yet to sign the accreditation documents the IRB has issued outlining what journalists and photographers can and cannot cover at the tournament.
“The IRB is attempting to hijack legitimate news coverage of the event for commercial purposes and seems blind to the responsibilities media have for covering news of public interest,” O’Hara said.
“We have done what we can to convince the IRB not to impose draconian restrictions on New Zealand non-rights television companies — in this case TVNZ and Sky — which would see them being allowed to screen only 30 seconds of news coverage, not only of any World Cup game but of the associated after-match press conference and player interviews at the game venue.”
While the likes of Sky and TVNZ are hoping the IRB will drop its 30-second news limit, they and other media companies have been shut out of audio and audio-visual internet news coverage.
The IRB has told news organisations that it will not allow print media or TV organisations to provide audio or audio-visual coverage on their news websites from events at World Cup official venues. — Fairfax
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