Foxtel’s Patrick Delany says regulation needed to ensure domestic TV market is competitive

Australia’s TV streaming market has been hit by the dominance of unregulated global giants, according to Foxtel chief Patrick Delany.

Foxtel CEO Patrick Delany: ‘Given the massive shifts in the competitive landscape, we do not believe the current regulatory environment for Foxtel is sustainable.' Picture: Britta Campion

The nation’s television streaming market has been “significantly impacted” by the dominance of unregulated global giants, Foxtel Group chief executive officer Patrick Delany said.

Speaking at Senate estimates in Canberra on Monday, Mr Delany said regulation was needed to ensure the domestic TV market could remain competitive.

“Our industry in Australia has been significantly impacted by competition from unregulated global streaming services such as Netflix, Amazon Prime and Disney+,” he said.

“Given the massive shifts in the competitive landscape, we do not believe the current regulatory environment for Foxtel is sustainable.

“That is not good for any Australian who believes in the importance of local media companies.”

Mr Delany described the large streaming companies as “global, very wealthy streaming organisations”.

Foxtel Group employs about 2000 employees and for each person an additional three people have jobs in the media industry.

Foxtel has about four million active subscribers across Australia who pay for services including Foxtel’s set-top box and streaming options Foxtel Now, Kayo Sports and BINGE.

The streaming services make up nearly half of Foxtel’s customer base.

Mr Delany said there is only a “handful of local players competing with global streaming giants in a very crowded marketplace”. Proposed reforms to broadcasting legislation would allow for modernisation and include a reduction in the new eligible drama obligation for Foxtel from 10 per cent to 5 per cent.

“We would like to have the flexibility to spend the money as we think in this fast-changing market – our subscribers would appreciate the content and secondly to get some flexibility our competitors have and we don’t,” Mr Delany said.

He said free-to-air services operate differently – they must abide by a quota system and they are not subject to the law changes.

Mr Delany said over the past five years Foxtel had spent 30 per cent more on “Australian factual, lifestyle and entertainment programming”.

He argued the proposed legislative changes to reduce Foxtel’s obligation to spending on drama content would not mean Australians would see less local TV content.

“It simply provides us with the commercial flexibility to invest in genres and formats that respond to viewers’ tastes,” Mr Delany said. “So, for us, this is a significant and overdue reform.”