State and territory current affairs will be relegated to a 10-minute slot in an extended Sunday night news bulletin when the local editions of 7.30 are axed, ending almost three decades of dedicated localism on the ABC.
Guardian Australia understands the seven separate 7.30 programs, one in each state and territory, will not survive the shake-up at the national broadcaster, which is soon to be hit with a substantial funding cut by the Coalition government.
As the ABC board waits for a final decision by the expenditure review committee, plans have been drawn up about where to make the cuts. The corporation may be forced to trim as much as $200m over four years from its annual $1.1bn budget.
The ABC has been waiting almost six months to hear its fate – after the government said in the May budget that a 1% cut to base funding was a “down payment” on bigger cuts to come.
Last month the communications minister, Malcolm Turnbull, said the ABC could afford to cut its budget by as much as $200m and still maintain a quality service.
The plan to permanently extend the Sunday news to 40 minutes is seen as a face-saving exercise by ABC management, which is bracing itself for attacks from the states for seemingly abandoning the coverage of local issues and for further centralising the ABC in Sydney.
While the Friday local current affairs programs will also end, some of the staff from each city will be retained to work on feature stories and investigations for Sunday nights. The savings are expected to come from dismantling the infrastructure of the programs, including studios, editors and camera operators.
Hosts set to lose their presenting roles are 30-year ABC veteran Quentin Dempster in New South Wales; Chris Kimball in the Australian Capital Territory; Josie Taylor in Victoria; Matt Wordsworth in Queensland; Simon Royal in South Australia; Airlie Ward in Tasmania and Louisa Rebgetz in the Northern Territory.
The 7.30 Report launched in 1986 and was entirely state-based until the end of 1995 when it went national with Kerry O’Brien as anchor, a decision which angered many viewers as well as ABC staff.
A separate program called Stateline was launched in 2001 by then managing director Brian Johns to appease the fury in what is known as the “BPAH states” – cities Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide and Hobart.
Almost 20 years on and the decision still rankles with some. O’Brien stayed until the end of 2010 and the program was relaunched as 7.30 with Leigh Sales and Chris Uhlmann in March 2011. It is now fronted by Sales alone.
Now four days a week, 7.30 is expected to extend to five days to replace the local editions. A new entertainment/news format hosted by Sales with the addition of Annabel Crabb and Dan Ilic is being discussed for the extra day.
A new standalone program tentatively titled Australian Correspondent which would cover local issues for a national audience is also under consideration.
A spokeswoman for the ABC said: “ABC News has been considering a range of ideas to identify savings, find more efficient ways of operating and best position the division for the future. No decisions have or will be made until the we know the size of the cut to the ABC budget. When we are able to make an announcement, our staff will be the first to know.”
