Pay TV: SBS and ABC are buying up content just to keep it off the air

The ABC is doing “aggressive” deals to lock out pay TV from showing the latest shows, the Australian Subscription TV & Radio Association has complained in a submission to the Government.

The allegation is contained in an ASTRA discussion paper submittted to the Department of Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy which has been released today.

ASTRA complains: “There is clear evidence of an increasingly aggressive attitude from the ABC and SBS towards ‘competition’ with the subscription television sector. The rhetoric and behaviour of both the ABC and SBS has included pursuit of commercial terms which seek to ensure longer than industry standard ‘hold back’ clauses in production and acquisition deals, and in some instances the ABC in particular has been willing to pay more for content to ensure this happens.

“The clear intent of these deals is to block programming being made available to subscription television for as long as possible. This seems inconsistent with the charter goal of making content as widely available as possible.”