News Journalism Payments Bill 2026, News Journalism Payments (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2026, News Media Bargaining (Administration) Bill 2026, News Media Bargaining Charge Bill 2026, Treasury Laws Amendment (News Media Bargaining) (Consequential) Bill 2026
Senator TYRRELL (Tasmania) (11:04): Journalism is an essential pillar of Australian democracy, helping to strengthen social cohesion and uphold democratic accountability. But quality journalism is costly to produce. While the commercial revenue that has traditionally supported news production has declined, digital advertising has shifted to a small number of global platforms like Facebook and Google.
These global players now collect massive digital advertising revenue while many Aussie news businesses remain under financial pressure. That just isn't right, and it isn't fair. Without action, Australians risk losing local and regional news services, reducing media diversity, public-interest journalism and democratic accountability.
Without media diversity and public-interest journalism, our democracy grinds to a halt and people can't easily find news reporting based on facts without plugging an agenda. We've seen it happen overseas. Australians can't afford to only get their news from shock jock, uninformed YouTubers instead of qualified rational journalists.
That's a recipe for disaster, a disaster for our critical thinking skills, for us as individuals and for us as a democratic country. So how do we fix the problem? We have to fix the bargaining imbalance between platforms and Australian news businesses.
The News Journalism Payments Bill 2026 and related bills tackle that bargaining imbalance through a carrot-and-stick model. These bills finally crack down on the platforms and push them into doing the right thing—making commercial agreements with Australian news publishers. This means platforms like Facebook pay Aussie news publishers in return for making money off their content.
It seems pretty fair, I reckon. Essentially, digital platforms like Facebook will be charged 2.75 per cent of their digital advertising revenue attributable to Australia, but platforms can reduce this charge and offset it through eligible commercial agreements with Australian news businesses. In other words, either they do the right thing and make deals or they have to pay up.
If platforms make money from Australian news, they should help sustain it either by investing directly through commercial agreements or by paying the incentive charge. These agreements are expected to deliver around $225 million to $275 million each year to support public-interest journalism and Australians' access to quality news and local reporting. Any revenue collected through this incentive charge will be returned in full to the Australian news industry, and this will help sustain a diverse news ecosystem and ensure Australians continue to have access to quality news and local reporting.
Payments to the news sector will be allocated based on the number of journalists an organisation employees, recognising that the more journalists employed, the greater the investment in public-interest journalism. But what I love about this bill is that it's also designed to help the small publishers that don't have many journos employed yet. Five per cent of the revenue will be dedicated to a separate grants program focused on supporting small publishers and start-ups to grow their businesses and produce news for local communities.
It's designed to help grow our news sector so that it's more diverse. I've spoken with many amazing organisations over the years who have pushed for changes like this—organisations like LINA. I also want to call out and celebrate that a 20 per cent uplift will apply for journalists employed by small and medium news organisations in regional and remote Australia.
It'll also apply to news organisations serving diverse communities, including First Nations and culturally and linguistically diverse communities. This recognises how hard it is to employ journalists in regional and remote Australia and the financial pressures facing smaller and community focused publishers. It is a massive win for all our journalists and news organisations down in Tassie.
I also want to recognise that these bills are the result of a heap of work over a number of years. Public consultation occurred back in 2025 and on the exposure draft legislation earlier this year. I want to call out the amazing work of the Minister for Communications, Anika Wells, and Assistant Treasurer, Dan Mulino.
I also want to call out both of their respective departments and the public servants who helped navigate the complex beast and their persistence over many years to make it happen. These bills are a really good news story, helping the Australian journalism sector and our broader democracy whilst holding the international digital platforms to account. To the digital platforms I say do the right thing and enter into commercial deals with our Aussie news publishers, and to my fellow senators I say support the bill, support commercial investment in Australian journalism and help a secure, sustainable, diverse and independent news media industry for the future.