Board members at the ABC have elected to take a 10% pay cut over the next six months in recognition of the economic downturn triggered by the coronavirus, which has sparked mass unemployment and cut a swathe through commercial media.
With the ABC poised on Wednesday to unveil its five-year strategic plan taking account of government budget cuts, Guardian Australia understands the board wrote to the Remuneration Tribunal and received its consent to cut fees by 10% for six months from July to December this year.
Board fees at the broadcaster range between $126,928 and $47,821, according to the ABC’s annual report.
The board’s move follows a decision by David Anderson, the ABC’s managing director, to take a 5% salary cut. Anderson told a staff meeting in mid-May that senior executives would forgo their bonuses and “at-risk” payments this financial year because of the Covid-19 crisis.
It also lines up with a similar request to the Remuneration Tribunal by the board of Australia Post. In March, the board of the postal service requested a 20% reduction in board fees between April and July.
The ABC has faced pressure from the Morrison government to embark on a six-month wage freeze. Guardian Australia revealed in May that the communications minister, Paul Fletcher, wrote to Anderson flagging his expectation that the organisation would defer a 2% increase for all employees scheduled to take effect in October under the ABC’s enterprise agreement.
Fletcher’s warning shot followed the government’s decision in early April to defer general wage increases for commonwealth public servants for six months. The public service commissioner followed up that directive by writing to all non-public service agencies – including the ABC – informing them the government expected them to adopt the same practice.
An ABC spokesman confirmed the board’s decision to cut fees in response to a question from Guardian Australia on Tuesday, but he said not decision had been taken yet on a wages freeze for staff.
“The board has made this decision in response to and in recognition of the difficult economic challenges being felt by many Australians at present,” the spokesman said. “Consideration of the staff wage increase deferral is still in discussion”.
The union representing journalists has expressed concern about the government’s intervention. Paul Murphy, the chief executive of the MEAA, said in May Fletcher had engaged in overreach. Murphy said the minister’s warning about the pay freeze was “just another shot in the culture wars” and indicative of the Coalition’s “unhealthy obsession with the ABC”.
Murphy said the intervention by the communications minister turned this “into an issue of ABC independence”. He said pay outcomes at the national broadcaster were “none of the government’s business” and any variation of the current enterprise agreement was a matter for ABC management and the unions, not the government.
Anderson told staff in an email last month management did not have the ability to unilaterally alter the working conditions of its employees, as was the case in some public sector agencies. But he legislation required the ABC to give consideration to any policy proposed by the minister in relation to the administration of the ABC, and he says “this consideration will be given”.
While commercial news in Australia has been hit by declining advertising revenue during the pandemic, triggering layoffs and the closure of some publications, the ABC has been battling rolling budget cuts.
Over the summer bushfires, the broadcaster had to absorb an additional $3m in emergency broadcasting costs on top of an $84m indexation pause imposed by the then prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, in 2018.
A recent report has revealed the ABC lost $783m in funding since the Coalition came to power in 2014. Anderson is slated to unveil the organisation’s response to those budget cuts on Wednesday. The expectation is substantial cuts to programming and services, on top of 250 redundancies, to meet the shortfall.
