Michael Wood: E tū negotiator on Canadian billionaire Jim Grenon's potential impact on NZME

An Auckland-based Canadian billionaire previously linked to an alternative news venture has taken a substantial holding in media company NZME.

NZME owns the NZ Herald, BusinessDesk and Newstalk ZB.

E tū negotiator Michael Wood says many are concerned about a potential change in editorial direction.

"The concern here is that we clearly have an individual that is highly motivated to take control of a major media entity in New Zealand and who is doing so, quite clearly, with the intent of promulgating a particular political perspective." 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Bryant Bridge, a new billionaire investor into enz into the
media company enz ME, which owns Senior Zealand Herald and
this station news Talk ZEBB, is wanting a clean out
of the company's board. Auckland based Canadian Jim Grennan has
told the company's board he wants to remove most of
the current directors. Concern is now growing amongst journalists and

(00:22):
staff about a possible move or a shift in editorial direction.
Michael Wood is the negotiation specialist at E two. He's
with me tonight. Hi Michael, Hi, what role are you
playing here?

Speaker 2 (00:37):
Well, as you can imagine, this is a significant interest
to our members, so many of the journalists at NZME
and as the union who represents them, we're working through
this issue with them, and I think it's fair to
say that the primary primary concern here is to ensure
that journalists are able to continue doing their job with

(00:58):
genuine editorial independence, without fear or favor. And the concern
here is that we clearly have an individual who is
highly motivated to take control of a major media entity
in New Zealand, who is doing so quite clearly was
the intent of promulgating a particular political perspective, and there

(01:18):
are real concerns about what that might mean for the
editorial independence of journalists are at Dyemans.

Speaker 1 (01:22):
Obviously, this has a process to go through. I mean,
you can't just overtake a board, right, so there's a
process that has to go through and there will be
other investors who will have to decide on this.

Speaker 2 (01:34):
That's right. There's clearly a commercial process which is playing
out here. But again one of the concerns here is
it's pretty cloak and daggers. When this individual originally took
a stake in the company last week, the comments he
made rule about dampening down any suggestion that there was
a bigger play here. And then this week, of course

(01:56):
we have learned that there is in fact a bigger play,
which is a move to potentially try and take over
the board and to install other people like minded people,
and some names have been reported on in that respect.
So there's not any openness or transparency here. There has
been no commitment made by mister Grennan to those principles
of editorial independence, which is critical. I remember we're talking

(02:19):
about one of the major media organizations in New Zealand.
It has a huge impact on our public's discourse in
New Zealand. Held has often been thought of as New
Zealand's paper of record. And we've never had a situation
where a particular individual with a lot of money and
a lot of power and a lot of influence has said, yeah,
I want that, and I want it because I want
to get my views out there. This is new territory

(02:41):
for New Zealand and we don't think that would be
healthy for our media environment.

Speaker 1 (02:45):
We don't know, of course, any of this yet, this
is speculation.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
Well, mister Greennan has purchased a significant stake. He has
gone on record today as saying that he wants to
create a position whereby he installed the majority of board members.
He has made a claim that he has support of
thirty seven percent of shareholders for that plan. As you
said before, there's clearly a corporate process which is playing
out here, but he has now laid out a very

(03:11):
clear plan in this area. And the background to that
as well is that mister Greenna has engaged in the
New Zealand media environment. He has set up a publication,
a network previously called The Centrist was a specific goal
about influencing the public discourse in New Zealand. So this
doesn't seem like an individual who is going in simply
because he wants to make a commercial investment, which is

(03:34):
what we normally get in the media environment. Mister Green
appears to be an individual who wants to make this
investment and wants to have this influence on the board
to push a particular agenda. And that's what makes us
different and worrying to other changes in courtporate media ownership
that we've seen over the years.

Speaker 1 (03:50):
Okay, Michael, I really appreciate you coming on the program.
Michael Wood, who's a negotiation specialist at the Two Union.
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