Thursday 19 May 2005
2005 Henry Mayer Lecture
Mr Graeme Samuel, AO, Chairman, Australian Competition and Consumer Commission
5.30-6.30pm – The Abel Smith Theatre – Bldg 23  [see Map]
University of Queensland, St Lucia Campus

Media Convergence and the Changing Face of Media Regulation

A transcript of Mr Samuel's paper is available online here, or as a download here in MS Word format [80kb].

The head of the Australia's consumer watchdog Graeme Samuel will speak at UQ on May 19 about the future for media regulation in Australia.

The chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said much of the debate about the future of Australian media outlets had missed the point.

"The job of regulation now is not so much determining how many TV stations there are or who can own what, but ensuring that people aren't locking up the content rights," Mr Samuel said.

"People are accessing a lot of content by the internet now and with the roll out of faster internet speeds, people will soon be bypassing and many young people already are, the traditional media and getting the content they want themselves via the internet."

Mr Samuel said the privatisation of Telstra was not a matter for the ACCC but it was crucial that whoever owned Telstra, that competitors continued to be allowed to access its network to be able to provide competition in all areas of telecommunications.

"Telstra is such a dominant carrier and has control over most of the infrastructure and it is our job to ensure that rival players can get their equipment installed or get access to Telstra's network so they can compete with Telstra.

"This will become even more important as people shift away from TV and radio and move more into the internet to get their content."
He said media convergence was not good or bad, but it would give us more control over how we viewed content and more power to groups who controlled the content.

Mr Samuel is presenting the Henry Mayer lecture in the Abel Smith Theatre (building 23), UQ St Lucia, from 5.30pm to 6.30pm.

Media: contact Ms Lin Enright (phone: 02 6243 1108, email: lin.enright@accc.gov.au) or Miguel Holland at UQ Communications on (phone: 07 3365 2619, email: m.holland@uq.edu.au)

About the presenter

Mr Samuel's professional career commenced as a Partner of the law firm Phillips Fox & Masel from 1972 to 1980. He then became Executive Director of Hill Samuel Australia Limited and subsequently Macquarie Bank Limited from 1981 to 1986 and co-founder of Grant Samuel & Associates in 1988.

Mr Samuel has held the following public offices (many of which he relinquished to assume his position with the ACCC):

• President of the National Competition Council (1997-2003)
• Commissioner of the Australian Football League (1984-2003)
• Chairman of Opera Australia (1995-2000)
• President of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (1995–97)
• Chairman of the Melbourne & Olympic Parks Trust (1995-2003)
• Member of the Board of the Docklands Authority (1997-2003)
• Director of Thakral Holdings Limited (1993-2003)
• Chairman of Playbox Theatre Company (1983-1995)
• Trustee of the Melbourne Cricket Ground Trust (1992-1998)
• Chairman of the Inner & Eastern Health Care Network (1995-2000)

Mr Samuel holds the following degrees and awards:

• Bachelor of Laws (Melbourne University)
• Master of Laws (Monash University)
• Life Member of the Australian Football League (1995)
• Officer in the General Division of the Order of Australia (1998)
• Australian Sports Medal, for services to sport (2000)
• Honorary Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (2000)
• Centenary Medal in recognition of his service as President of the National Competition Council (2003)
• Honorary Life Trustee of the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA) (2003)

About the Henry Mayer Lecture

This lecture is the first in a series of annual lectures, commemorating Professor Henry Mayer, who in 1976 founded the journal Media International Australia, now one of Australia's premier academic journals dealing with the media industries.

In 1993 an inaugural Henry Mayer lecture was presented by Bruce Gyngell at the Sydney Opera House. The intention was to make this an annual event but institutional support was not forthcoming and the idea lapsed. Tom O'Regan and Graeme Turner have revived the plan for an annual memorial lecture jointly presented by MIA and the CCCS. We are pleased to say that this lecture from Graeme Samuel will inaugurate an annual Henry Mayer lecture hosted by the CCCS and MIA.

MIA was published by the Australian Film, Television and Radio School until 1997, when it moved to the Centre for Cultural and Media Policy at Griffith University. At that time, it was merged with the Centre's journal, Culture and Policy. From 2004, it became a publication of the School of EMSAH and the Centre for Critical and Cultural Studies, at The University of Queensland.

This lecture will be chaired by Professor Tom O'Regan, publisher of MIA.

Members of the public are invited to attend these free lectures, after which light refreshments will be served.
 
Enquiries to Ms Rebecca Ralph, Centre for Critical and Cultural Studies.
Phone (07) 3346 9764, fax (07) 3365 7184, email admin.cccs@uq.edu.au