Andrew Wilkie voted moderately for increasing the diversity of media ownership

The majority voted in favour of passing the bills. In parliamentary jargon, they voted to read them for a third time. This means that the bills will now go to the Senate, where they can decide whether to also pass them so they can become law.

What do the bills do?

The bills are part of an "historic package of reforms" that the Government announced earlier this year that affect free-to-air broadcasting in Australia.

Most controversially, the bills will repeal the ‘2 out of 3 cross-media control rule’, which:

prohibits a person controlling more than two out of three regulated media platforms (that is, a commercial television broadcasting licence, a commercial radio broadcasting licence and an associated newspaper) in any one commercial radio licence area.

Read more in the explanatory memorandum.

The majority voted against an amendment introduced by Australian Labor MP Michelle Rowland (Greenway), which means the amendment failed.

What did the amendment do?

This bill proposes to repeal the ‘2 out of 3 cross-media control rule’, which:

prohibits a person controlling more than two out of three regulated media platforms (that is, a commercial television broadcasting licence, a commercial radio broadcasting licence and an associated newspaper) in any one commercial radio licence area.

Read more in the explanatory memorandum.

This amendment would have removed that part of the bill so that the 2 out of 3 cross-media control rule remains unchanged.

The majority voted in favour of the bills' main idea. In parliamentary jargon, they voted to read them for a second time. This means that they can now discuss the bills in more detail.

What is the bills' main idea?

The bills are part of an "historic package of reforms" that the Government announced earlier this year that affect free-to-air broadcasting in Australia.

Most controversially, the bills will repeal the ‘2 out of 3 cross-media control rule’, which:

prohibits a person controlling more than two out of three regulated media platforms (that is, a commercial television broadcasting licence, a commercial radio broadcasting licence and an associated newspaper) in any one commercial radio licence area.

Read more in the explanatory memorandum.

The majority voted against amendments introduced by Labor MP Michelle Rowland, which means they were unsuccessful.

The amendments would have deleted schedule 2 from the bill, which would have gotten rid of:

the two out of three cross-media control rule which ... prohibits a person controlling more than two out of three regulated media platforms (that is, a commercial television broadcasting licence, a commercial radio broadcasting licence and an associated newspaper) in any one commercial radio licence area.

What does this bill do?

The bill will get rid of certain media ownership, control and diversity laws, like the ‘75% audience reach rule’, which stops commercial television broadcasting licensees from controlling licences if the combined licence area has a population over 75% of Australia' population. It also gets rid of the ‘2 out of 3 cross-media control rule’, which "prohibits control over more than two out of three regulated media platforms in any one commercial radio licence area".

Read more in the bills digest.

Amendment text

(1) Clause 2, page 2 (table item 2, column 1), omit “Schedules 1 and 2”, substitute “Schedule 1”.

(2) Schedule 2, page 4 (line 1) to page 5 (line 14), omit the Schedule.

The majority agreed with the main idea of the bill, which means they can now discuss it in more detail. In parliamentary jargon, they voted to read the bill for a second time.

What is the bill's main idea?

The bill will get rid of certain media ownership, control and diversity laws, like the ‘75% audience reach rule’, which stops commercial television broadcasting licensees from controlling licences if the combined licence area has a population over 75% of Australia' population. It also gets rid of the ‘2 out of 3 cross-media control rule’, which "prohibits control over more than two out of three regulated media platforms in any one commercial radio licence area".

Read more in the bills digest.