The Australia - 14 November 2011
THE top five independent production companies making entertainment, factual and documentary programs for the ABC received more than a quarter of its budget for those genres for the past three years.
The ABC has commissioned 232 projects from 156 companies since the 2008-09 financial year, according to evidence given to the Senate inquiry into ABC programming and at Senate estimates hearings.
In an answer to questions on notice, the ABC revealed some of the detail of those commissions -- but not all. "Of ABC's total spend in entertainment, documentaries and factual from 2008-09 to 2010-11, 27 per cent was directed to projects from the top five production companies for each genre."
The 27 per cent figure the ABC released includes money spent on internally produced programs such as Spicks and Specks, so it remains unclear what percentage of the outsourcing budget goes to the top five production companies. The ABC also failed to list who the top five companies were, although it is not difficult to ascertain from the programs broadcast on ABC1. The only company the ABC would confirm was in the top five was Andrew Denton and Anita Jacoby's company, Zapruder's Other Films, which makes some of the ABC's most popular and acclaimed programs. Zapruder's Gruen Planet, which ends its run this week, regularly attracts an audience of more than a million.
Zapruder's has made nine programs in the past three years for the ABC. Zapruder's was also behind Denton's successful Enough Rope talk series. But the ABC refused to name the other production companies that took the majority of its commissions. It did not answer a specific question about what percentage of the budget for entertainment and features went to Zapruder's.
"Payments to specific production companies is commercial-in-confidence," the ABC told the Senate at the inquiry into programming decisions.
