Amended NBI finally goes before Parliament

Negotiations are set to commence for the already embattled and highly criticised bill intended to equalise and sustain Australia’s media landscape.

It’s been a long road for the News Bargaining Incentive (NBI) Bill, and its newly named companion, the News Journalism Payments Bill, after their official introduction to Parliament on 13 August.

Intended to modernise the Morrison government’s 2021 News Media Bargaining Code, which prompted Facebook to temporarily ban news on Australia and saw Meta walk away from renewing paid news deals, the NBI has sparked reactions from both ends of the spectrum since its April 2026 drafting.

As reported, Meta slammed the new incentive as “discriminatory” and “grossly unfair”, while the Community Broadcasting Association of Australia (CBAA) suggested the unintended consequences on regional or independent publishers.

According to media reports, last-minute negotiations between the government and Coalition led to a restoration of the 25 per cent big-publisher cap – potentially to quell furore from major media companies.

Recent changes also saw the final legislative package include an increase to the minimum deal threshold to eight, and a decrease to the base rate for calculating the levy from three years of digital advertising revenue to two.

Early August also saw a levy increase from 2.25 per cent to 2.5 per cent and the introduction of a grant program for early-stage, start-up and small publishers.

According to Minister for Communications Anika Wells, the changes will ensure journalists get their fair share from digital platforms that benefit the Australian news.

She said: “People access news in different ways and from different sources, which is why we made changes to the distribution scheme to better support smaller and diverse media organisations.”

Similarly, Assistant Treasurer Daniel Mulino said: “We want to see deals between digital platforms and a diverse range of media organisations to ensure fair recompense for the use of content.”

“We also want to ensure the media sector is strengthened from large companies to small ones, recognising the significant benefits strong journalism brings to communities across the nation.”

Shadow minister for communications and digital safety and Liberal Senator Sarah Henderson said Australian media companies and journalists are facing “unnecessary uncertainty”.

She said: “The media sector has warned that Labor’s previous proposals would weaken the incentive for digital platforms to strike fair commercial deals, reduce the funding available for Australian journalism and put further newsroom jobs at risk.”

Kevin Hogan, shadow assistant treasurer and shadow minister for financial services, said: “The accurate calculation of advertising revenues earned by the digital platforms is of paramount importance … the test is whether it delivers fair and sustainable compensation for Australian journalism, rather than another free kick for multinational tech giants.”

As recently reported, the News Bargaining Incentive and the government’s recently announced Office of AI are both purposed to establish greater sustainability in the media sector and support the retention and creation of journalism roles in an increasingly unpredictable landscape.

More to come.

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