Taking a Stance

The New Zealand Film and Video Technicians’ Guild position statement on the current New Zealand film industry downturn.

How we got to this position?

Activity and direct offshore investment increased over the past 20 years largely due to big players like **Rob Tapert **(with his combination of movies and TV shows) and the US production budgets attracted down here by Peter Jackson and also films like The Last Samurai, The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe (and sequels), The Vertical Limit etc. There are also the medium to small players like Power Rangers and the many Disney movies and US movie of the weeks that came here throughout the 1990s and 2000s. The exchange rate has gradually risen, especially in recent years, and this has slowed down the inflow of work. In turn, the Large Budget Screen Production Grant (LBSPG) was introduced. In the last couple of years, many of our closest competitors for the ‘runaway productions’ have recognized the benefits of using incentives to attract productions to their countries and have introduced higher, more complex and targeted incentive schemes. Unfortunately, NZ has slipped to the bottom of the list and is apparently now out of consideration for the offshore productions whose direct investment has, until now, been such a boost for local industry development here.

Acknowledge the total benefits to the industry, economy and country of the offshore productions.

The Techos’ Guild believes the economic benefits to the country have been manifestly understated in the analysis the Government is acting on. We would encourage the Government to engage with the industry, and explore the many tangible benefits and flow-on effects that a correctly targeted incentive/rebate delivers well in excess of its cost.

Incentive setting strategy.

NZ needs a better incentive setting mechanism, one which factors in our exchange rate and the current relative incentive schemes of competitors, and then adjusts to keep NZ in contention for offshore productions. We believe the two-yearly review (that was done with minimal industry consultation) provides us with the wrong answers and it threatens the careers of many of our members around the country. The Guild feels even a small, but correctly set, incentive increase can make a difference to the inflow of projects. We don’t want to participate in a race to the bottom and we just hope for an incentive at the minimum level required to keep us in the game.

Fee for service and IP generation.

The film industry has been getting strong indication from the Minister of Economic Development Steven Joyce that the Government wants the NZ industry to move away from a fee-for-service model of business to an IP creation model. It’s the firm belief of The Techos’ Guild that the fee-for-service model within the film industry and an IP generation model are not mutually exclusive concepts that our industry needs to choose between. Rather they have a symbiotic relationship with one assisting and enabling the other. IP creation incurs a high cost and successful commercialisation of it has a low percentage success rate. To effectively achieve it we need to retain the talent and creativity that a functional and well-funded fee-for-service industry enables. Many of our members operate below the line and are unlikely to create or generate significant IP or move beyond the fee-for-service model. The industry’s workforce supports and enables the creation of IP within the NZ industry through using their skills to collaborate in the creative processes that leads to local IP generation. This, in turn, is enabled by encouraging offshore productions to film here.

Engagement with Government.

The Techos’ Guild wants to build a constructive framework between local industry and Government, in order to improve communication and outcomes for the NZ film industry and ensure that it remains a healthy productive sector of our economy.