Crisis Comms: The Hobbit Roundup

After only two days of negotiations, PM John Key announced in a press conference that the Government would indeed be backing the $670 million dollar project The Hobbit to be made in New Zealand. Everyone except the Green Party applauded the decision.

With the deal comes job security for thousands of Kiwi’s, and we’ve secured one of the premier’s of the film to be on home turf - the Government in return providing US$10m for marketing costs and another possible US$7.5m in tax breaks for the two films, subject to their success.

The total bill for New Zealand just under $100m – but due to the fast acting on our part for this crisis to be resolved, I would think it was worth it.

So urgent new legislation changes have been rolled out that will apply to our entire film industry, which…"will ensure film workers hired as contractors will not be able to later argue in court that they were employees.”– New Zealand Herald

But how did all this mess begin in the first place? Pretty much overnight it was announced that producers of the film were preparing to move production off-shore, and all down to what Peter Jackson says is industrial action by NZ Actors’ Equity and Australian Union Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance undermining confidence in NZ as a stable employment environment. The turmoil caused Warner Bros to be very concerned about their $500m investment.

"Seemingly overnight, NZ Actors' Equity shredded the reputation of a burgeoning industry, which has been over forty years in the making”

Following this there was a Facebook page in support of keeping the films here, a cast of thousands rallying across the country in Auckland, Christchurch, Hamilton, Queenstown, and Matamata. A full page ad was also taken out in The Dominion Post in hopes that the team from Warner Bros would see and statements from the PM that they were asking for too much out of our small wallet.

Who knows if they did see it, but a solution was found and everyone seems to be happy. I commend the Government for finding a solution so quickly – there really is nothing worse than a contentious issue being dragged out – in my view it annoys people because of how saturated it gets by the media, more so than the heart of the problem itself.

Written by Jess Miller