OUR RADIO SERVICE

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 7, Issue 23, 12 November 1943, Page 4

OUR RADIO SERVICE

THE annual report of the National Radio BroadcastingService shows that finances are in a healthy condition. They are so healthy,, indeed, that most people will again want to know why it remains impossible to reduce the licence fee. The year's surplus was £374,361. "A further £380,000 was invested during the year," says the report, "to provide for future development, and to overtake arrears of construction and equipment . . ~ making" a total of £1,180,000 now invested for this purpose." There is also an Accu-' ? mulated Fund, embracing all reserves, which must have reached a considerable sum. The N.B.S. is therefore in a sound financial position. It is creating assets which are to be employed, at some unspecified date,, in improvements which remain equally vague. Doubtless there will be new and bigger studios, and developments of a severely technical nature, A few thousand pounds may be spared, in happier times, to expand the programme service. It will be surprising, however, if the greater part of the money is not invested in bricks and mortar. The official emphasis in New Zealand rests heavily on material enterprises. There appears to be no one in Wellington with sufficient imagination, or persuasive capacity, to impress on the Government the simple fact that licence fees should be returned to the people in cultural and entertainment values. If better programmes are not to be thought of until after the war, the fee should be reduced. It is abnormally high, and it has to be paid in a lump sum—two reasons why broadcasting is still more of a luxury than it has any right to be. But why is it necessary to wait until the return of peace for any kind of improvement? In the meantime, however, there is one simple remedy for many of the present imperfections. If performers were paid higher fees the quality of the programmes would inevitably improve. New Zealand artists are not encouraged to regard the radio as their great opportunity. There appears to be a" curious belief that persons who are permitted to make use of the microphone are receiving a valuable publicity which more than compensates them for the modesty of the fee. This is an extreme form of the provincialism which clings like a blight to New Zealand culture. The Dominion is probably the. hardest place in the world for an artist who feels the need for self-ex-pression. Writers have no markets for short stories. Poets sing to their friends or to themselves. Musicians must be teachers if they hope to make a living. Yet broadcasting, the one State service which should be able to provide an outlet for talent, has fallen away into dullness, orthodoxy and parsimony. The money is available for a modest development. If it is allowed to accumlulate much further the authorities will feel compelled to cast around for grandiose enterprises. But what is the use of large and glittering studios if the artists are admitted to them as it were on sufferance, and with the promise of fees so niggardly that there is no incentive to creative effort? The: N.B.S. should be building up 1 reserves in culture instead of money.