The Wire

This afternoon, Mark Latham announced that the Labor Party will support the US-Australia Free Trade Agreement (or FTA) with certain amendments. The agreement, which was brokered by the Federal Government, has been stalled until recently. The ALP put off voting on the deal, until Labor members in a Senate committee reported back this morning. But one-third of the ALP voted against supporting the FTA. As a result, the Labor Party are still holding out for concessions on the proposed changes to the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, and to local content rules for the media. The cultural impact of new local content rules in the FTA has many people extremely worried. Under the current rules, to protect Australian culture, a certain percent of all radio, television and advertising broadcasts must be Australian. For instance, free to air television has to be 55 per cent local content. Sarah Dingle spoke to Megan Elliot, a member of the Australian Coalition for Cultural Diversity, about what the proposed FTA means for Australian culture, and also Greens Senator Bob Brown.