What’s ‘public’ about public broadcasting, anyway?

I shall have to preface this by admitting that I don’t watch a lot of local TV. Not actually possessing a functioning television set is one of my reasons:  another is the fact that I simply am not intrigued enough to actually ever buy one… especially when most channels (including Malta’s national ones) can nowadays be streamed live on demand anyway.

It is, in fact, the ability to watch TV on my computer that has persuaded me that the entire medium has become somewhat redundant. Part of me – the nostalgic part – retains fond memories of consulting the ‘TV Sorrisi e Canzoni’ to find out what time my favourite cartoons were showing. Even the practical part misses the discipline implicit in the forced routine of children’s television: a discipline I never really appreciated at the time, but I now realise was invaluable. 

For example, if we wanted to watch the latest episode of Doctor Who, our homework had to be finished before six pm. Whether it was actually finished or not (hardly ever, in my case) is beside the point. The arrangement came complete with simple rules that hammered the chaos of childhood into some semblance of order… however much those rules were broken. 

Then there was the small matter that you had to wait A WHOLE WEEK, after the last episode ended with the Doctor being thrown bodily into the lair of Aggedor, the flesh-eating Monster of Peladon. Have you ever tried counting how many seconds there are in a whole week? I did, and I still remember the precise answer to this day: it’s 604,800. And every darn one of them felt like an eternity…

Today’s scenario is rather different. Pretty much anything you want to watch can be played on demand on sites such as Youtube and Daily Motion. You might not find the very latest series… at least, not without doing anything illegal… but those too will one day become viewable. And unlike the old days, when we were slaves to a schedule arbitrarily decided by a bunch of suits around a boardroom table… in the digital age, you are free to make up your own schedule as you go along.

I still can’t decide if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. It’s kind of nice to while away a sleepless night watching all your old TV favourites online… until you realise that the reason you can’t sleep is precisely because the digital age has banished a certain routine from your life forever.

But there can be no doubt which of those two scenarios is more convenient. And this in turn implies that the future of television is now inextricably bound to the formless, shapeless universe of the Internet: where what little remains of the suits’ power is virtually nullified.

Ultimately – as with all things internet-related – it is a question of competition. Today’s television has to compete with anything accessible online, at any time of the day. And as more people abandon traditional broadcasting for online stations, the business model will likewise change (as it already has for the print media). I can’t predict how the migration will affect advertising revenue, but two things are more or less certain: one, there is no longer such a thing as ‘peak-time’; and two, advertisers will not be willing to pay as much for an ad that can be skipped after four seconds.    

It seems the dominion of television, for better or for worse, is veering towards its twilight years. I suspect by now you will have worked out the implications for the local TV landscape: which are not exactly rosy.

Let’s start with the private stations, two of which are owned and run by two parties that are already crippled by debt. Already we have seen wage freezes at one of these stations – NET – and it is safe to say that if both stations still exist at all, it is only because they serve their owners a useful strategic purpose. It is therefore only a matter of time before the financial cost outweighs the political advantage.

The same, however, is not true for Public Broadcasting Services, which has access to public funding to keep it afloat. To be fair, much of its output is also financially self-sufficient. But if claims by Jason Micallef (One Productions CEO) are to be believed, the company as a whole incurred a debt of €14 million in 2015, despite an annual government subsidy of €3.5 million.

It follows, then, that PBS – not unlike other government-owned entities – is held aloft by the Maltese taxpayer. And the Maltese taxpayer doesn’t complain too loudly, either. Audience ratings have repeatedly confirmed that most people trust PBS more than private stations when it comes to news and current affairs. It is also palpable that a great many people in this country consider the provision of a national television service to be part of the responsibilities of the government of the day… and are more than willing to finance it themselves.

‘Public broadcasting’ is therefore very much alive and kicking in this country. It is artificially sustained, of course… as are private stations… but this only raises the most pivotal question of all.

Whose purpose does PBS exist to serve? The general public, which is ultimately its majority shareholder, and which the station is statutorily committed to serve? Or whichever of the two political parties happens to be in government at the time?

A cursory glance at recent PBS board decisions points towards an answer (in case you haven’t already figured it out). This week, the board decided to summarily axe two programmes – Madwarna, presented by Salvu Mallia, and Times Talk, presented by Herman Grech and Mark Micallef (and produced by the eponymous newspaper).

Like I said earlier, I am not a fan of either in particular. And under normal circumstances I would be perfectly content to accept the argument, put forward by Pablo Micallef (of ‘Deal or No deal’ fame), that no programme is entitled to a life-tenure at the national station. 

But the circumstances are not exactly ordinary. For one thing, some programmes do seem to enjoy a ‘cens perpetwu’ on PBS. Xarabank, for instance, has been around longer than many people reading this article. According to reports, it somehow survived a similar decision by the PBS board last week. And as with the later decision to axe two programmes, no reasons were given when the order was overturned.

That is not to say that no valid reasons might exist. It is just that the reasons were never communicated to the people who (theoretically) matter the most: the general public, which owns the national station and pays for its upkeep.

That is simply no way for a board – any board – to treat the shareholders to whom it is responsible. It would be anomalous even if the two programmes concerned were unanimously agreed to be flops. But seeing how both had a following, and that one in particular – ‘Madwarna’ – was repeatedly confirmed a fan favourite… the complete silence by PBS is not just astounding, but also unnerving.

It takes us back to the question of why successive governments have so liberally availed of public money to finance the ailing national broadcaster. If the intention really were to serve a public interest, then PBS would be expected to offer a detailed public explanation for its decision to limit what the public can and cannot watch. The simple fact that no explanation was forthcoming merely confirms that PBS serves a very different purpose altogether. After all, as long as the government is pleased with the content… who gives a toss about what the people watching it think, anyway?

Naturally, this will have been expected by all but the most naïve among you… and yet there is one aspect that does surprise me slightly. We all know that PBS is (and has always been) an extension of the prevailing government’s propaganda machine… and that this never really changed since the days of Xandir Malta, regardless of who was in power. 

But in the past – yes, even in the days of Xandir Malta – there was at least the pretence that the general public mattered ever so slightly. Past administrations (Labour and PN) always hotly denied allegations of political bias; there was always some of kind of public relations exercise aimed at justifying the ways of PBS to the man in the street.

Not anymore, it seems. The PBS board no longer seems keen on hiding its true nature as the executioner of popular dissent. So no sooner did Salvu Mallia criticise the government in a Facebook post, and publicly toyed with the idea of contesting an election with another party… than down fell the chopper.

The timing could, of course, be a coincidence. But in that case, it would be up to PBS to make its reasons public… and also to announce what, if anything, would be shown instead to compensate viewers for the loss of two popular programmes.   

It all goes back to the ‘P’ part of the acronym ‘Public Broadcasting Service’. How can a station accurately be described as ‘public’, when it disrespects the public to such an alarming extent? When it allows its action to create the inescapable impression of political vindictiveness, and no longer even disguises its naked drive to simply control all levels of public expression? 

As with so many other things, it is the sheer bullishness that gives the game away. PBS has become just another private fiefdom, to be administered by the inner sanctum of whichever political party now calls all the shots. ‘We’re in power, we decide what you watch… if you don’t like it, you can lump it (even if you’re the still the one paying for it all, at the end of the day)’. 

Very nice, I must say. And I’m supposed to buy a TV just for that? You’ve got to be kidding…