NZ Invited Press Barons

Special Correspondent

Two international newspaper groups were invited to New Zealand in 1957 in a bid to save a daily paper.

Now the groups are banned from this country by the News Media Ownership Act—and the newspaper which invited them is dead. The newspaper was the Manawatu Times, which was bought and killed by the Dominion in 1963.

The Times had been in desperate straits for some years, and was losing money.

About 1957, Times editor Doug Davies, with the consent of the Times directors, wrote to Sir Frank Packer, of the Sydney Amalgamated Press group, and Lord (then Mr. Roy) Thomson.

He invited them to consider investing in the Times, and both of them expressed keen interest.

However, in 1958 the Times turned the corner back to profitability and it was not felt necessary to carry on discussions.

The following year negotiations began which resulted in the merger of the Times company with other newspaper companies in Rotorua, Wanganui and Levin.

It was this company which sold the Times to the Dominion.

It can be safely predicted that, had either of the overseas press groups come to Palmerston North, the Manawatu Times would still be alive today.

This must cause the National Government some considerable embarrassment.