RNZ Job Cuts $11.8M Budget Blowout Risk

The staff will take to the streets outside the broadcaster’s offices in Wellington and Auckland starting at lunchtime on Tuesday, reports RNZ’s Mary Argue. The RNZ layoffs pickets are union-supported. Workers are being called on to foot the bill for mistakes way above their pay grade, union E tū and the Public Service Association (PSA) say. As Radio New Zealand has cut back on staff, a question many New Zealand employees are now asking is whether they can be fired for a blunder they didn’t commit.

What happened: the $11.8 million budget blowout

The year to June had seen RNZ make a loss of $11.8m, compared with $470,000 which it had predicted. The annual budget deficit was revealed as part of the RNZ budget. By the end of March 2027, RNZ will have eliminated the equivalent of 58 full-time positions, and at least five per cent of its operating costs. This is approximately 20% of the staff.

This $11.8m budget over-run is an RNZ financial crisis. RNZ said it hadn’t warned the board about the shortfall in its internal financial reporting. The Spinoff reported that $2 million of land sales was mistakenly recorded as revenue, and personnel expenses exceeded by $3.2 million, with $1.4 million of that being for redundancy payments. RNZ also predicts another pee-chee $7.8m deficit in 2026/27, a transitional year.

Management has accepted responsibility

Critics dub it “broadcaster’s financial mismanagement. The outgoing CEO has admitted, and the board has mandated a separate review. The chairman of the board of the company called the loss “incomprehensible”. “It’s a terrible situation; the buck stops somewhere” was the message from shareholding minister David Seymour.

Here’s the essence of employer responsibility for financial losses. Senior leadership has recognised the failure, but the cuts are made to frontline jobs. E tū alleges RNZ is shifting blame, and the Government is too complicit not to take responsibility and take ownership of the situation on the ground and leave workers to bear the burden.

The workers’ side: “none of their fault”

Staff are being ‘burdened’ with financial mistakes made by others, according to E tū. The board and senior management apparently didn’t look into other alternatives before cutting, according to its director Amy Hansen. Her words: Staff shouldn’t be at the end of the chopping block when this is not their fault.

PSA’s stance is that this is a matter of financial responsibility for public broadcasting. National secretary Fleur Fitzsimons says she would not have expected a gaffe to come from RNZ and believes they shouldn’t be blamed. The PSA estimates that the proposal will eliminate 58 of its 340 or so employees. These are the key concerns of the core RNZ staff.

E tū have also raised a series of demands. It calls for any further discussion of job cuts to be suspended, the business case to be published, other cuts demonstrated (including at board level) and a real worker voice.

Funding pressure behind the numbers

It wasn’t an isolated incident. E tū says the Government has taken away funding for RNZ of $4.6m a year in 2025 and clawed back an additional $1.4m in May. This story is now enmeshed in the debate over funding for public media in New Zealand. RNZ announced earlier in August it would be making cuts of 10% or so of its staff. The newest one is a bolder move towards a reconfiguration of the media business.

It’s also part of a trend of media closures in New Zealand. TVNZ earlier confirmed massive job cuts, attributing them to the slump in revenue. The reduction in employment in the wider media industry and public sector job losses, spread through agencies such as Health NZ, indicate the number of people who are at risk of job security during budget reductions. Whilst for many, job security in New Zealand has grown less secure compared to a few years ago.

Your rights if your role is proposed for disestablishment

This is general information only, and not a legal opinion. Those who are impacted should review their own contract and contact their union or attorney. New Zealand employment rights require an employer to act in good faith. A redundancy must be a genuine and fair business redundancy.

Consultation: If layoffs are to be considered, it is expected that the employees will be consulted beforehand. Information about the proposal and an opportunity for workers to comment, including suggestions for alternatives, should be provided to workers.
Fair process: The redundancies of RNZ staff come on top of an accounting failure, so it is likely that there will be some concerns around the RNZ staff redundancies that could be considered as unfair. Staff members who feel a process was unjustifiable will have the option to raise a personal grievance, and there are strict time limitations.
Redundancy compensation in New Zealand is not normally a right of a worker. Typically it will come down to what is contained in the employment contract, and therefore employee redundancy rights NZ will differ between workplaces. Collective agreement participants who are covered by collective agreements have better terms.
Policies: There are workplace restructuring policies that can be written and outline notice, selection criteria and redeployment responsibilities. Staff to request a copy.

What comes next

RNZ has admitted the stress. The cuts will be due by the end of March, the broadcaster says. The adjustment to its people’s lifestyle to live within their means is tough, the spokesperson said. Whether the changes in RNZ’s organisation are genuine consultation will be seen this coming week, and how the RNZ cost-saving measures will be formed.

The larger issue remains unresolved. When a board and management admit they were at fault because they weren’t reporting, how far do the repercussions go to the regular worker?