The government’s news bargaining incentive (NBI) consultation paper is welcome but it has taken too long to get to this point, the envisaged scheme is complex and it risks favouring the big tech companies.

The background to all this is important. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission’s digital platform inquiry, which was completed in mid-2019, recommended what became the news media bargaining code (NMBC). The logic was that Google and Facebook, in particular, were benefiting significantly from news content without paying for it.

The ACCC recommended that a voluntary scheme of negotiation for a fair payment be tried first but this failed as it could not overcome the huge bargaining power advantage that the platforms had over the publishers.

No business can keep producing without being paid for what they produce. Journalists hold power to account, they provide a journal of record as to what is going on and they allow debate based on fact. Journalism is fundamental to our democracy. Getting the NMBC right was vital and the same necessity applies to the NBI.

Let’s deal with the issues.

The original bargaining code was extremely successful. Three- and five-year deals were entered into by Google and Facebook with virtually all publishers,........

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