Prime Media: John Hartigan poised to sign off following Seven merger vote

John Hartigan warns that regional Australia is crying out to be heard and politicians can’t afford to ignore the bush.

John Hartigan is likely to step down as Prime Media chairman. Picture: Jane Dempster

Hot and dry. That’s the weather forecast, out where John Hartigan keeps his farm.

The winds of change are blowing, too.

Hartigan — Harto — has for three decades been a significant player on the Australian media landscape. That’s likely to come to an end on Thursday afternoon.

That’s the day of the merger vote of regional broadcaster Prime Media. But the agreed merger with Kerry Stokes’s Seven West Media television network may not get up given a blocking stake held by two key investors, and Hartigan is expected to bow out as chairman immediately after the opportunity dies.

“That’s not something I can talk about,” he says, but if he does go, it will hardly be a shock. Hartigan flagged his intention to leave Prime a little over a year ago, but stayed on, “because there was a trickle of an opportunity to do a deal”.

“But the fact is that the vote is going to fail,” he said. “It will fail because of the voting intentions of Bruce Gordon, and Antony Catalano, backed by Alex Waislitz. They’ve got totally different agendas from the rest of the shareholders.

“So I’ll make my decision when the vote comes down. It’s a shame, because the shareholders who support the Seven deal can see that Prime is operating with two hands tied behind its back.

“The rules for regional television — WIN, Southern Cross, and Prime — were set in the mid-1980s, when Bob Hawke was prime minister.

“We are still operating in that framework, designed before the internet was even thought about, before steaming, before Netflix, before iView, before SBS on-demand.

“The competition has increased by 400 per cent, and not surprisingly, that’s really hit our earnings.

“The opportunity to hook up with Seven will enable us to compete, but that will not be happening.”

Hartigan sees the likely failure of the deal as part of a larger and much more serious problem.

“People who live outside the big metropolitan centres are rapidly becoming second-class citizens in this country,” he said.

“I feel a tsunami of anger from regional Australia, on all kinds of issues: regional media is one, but there’s also energy policy, water, and now, especially, bush fires.

“The only debate you get in the Sydney is about the laryngitis from the smoke, how inconvenient it is.

“My neighbours have been fighting fires for a month, and they’ll still be fighting them in March.”

He nearly lost his own cherished property near Wollombi, and has personally written to those neighbours and friends who came out determined to help him save it. “Had it not been for four young guys who downed tools for me, I have no doubt that my house, and some of my neighbours, would not be standing.

“That is the spirit of the bush, too. People see themselves as part of a community. But in the cities, we have this debate, totally polarised: is it climate change, or extreme weather events?

“I don’t care about labels. You’ve got to do something to mitigate it. Australians normally dance in the centre of the dance floor, politically, but you’ve got both sides on the flanks, and as long as they remain there, there’s no hope of a solution.

“We need a national summit. Droughts, water, energy and bushfires. My view is you’ve got to give the scientists, and the fire fighters, the benefit of the doubt.

“At the moment, we’re reactive. We tap emergency funding. We have to get ahead of this. The fire burning still near my place (in the Lower Hunter, NSW) has burnt through 400,000 hectares, through three national parks. I’ve spent all winter carefully backburning and it still came close.”

Hartigan was, in 2002, part of the Farmhand group, along with broadcaster Alan Jones, industrialist Richard Pratt and broadcast billionaire Kerry Packer, raising funds for that year’s drought victims, “but also to plot what could be done to limit any future drought, to plan water policy.

“This was not the idle thoughts of people sitting back smoking cigars. This was seeking the best advice, and that report will be sitting on a shelf getting dusty.

“Now, again, we’ve been fighting fires for a month. And it’s one of many serious problems they’ve got on their hands, and politicians just think, oh, we can afford to ignore the bush, but they’d want to be careful.

“The voices of people who don’t live a metropolitan life aren’t being heard, but they will make themselves heard, you can count on that.

“Regional newspapers have been decimated. (WIN owner) Bruce Gordon has already closed parts of the WIN operation, and is threatening to close more.

“Prime can only make similar decisions if it wants to compete, so you’ll end up with a plenty of streaming of US soaps and movies, but nothing fundamental to the Australian bush.

“The towns outside the big cities, the people, they are what give Australia its flavour. I grew up in the bush, and I have the farm, and if you want to know what’s going on in an unembossed way, talk to somebody in the bush.

“The National Party and politicians in general should take note: what happened in the mid-west in the US, and now the midlands in Britain, can happen here. The Australian bush wants to be heard, and it’s time to listen.”