NZ On Air defends The GC

STACEY KIRK

In response to public backlash against their use of taxpayer money, NZ On Air have released the proposal for The GC, billing it as an "8 x half-hour observational documentary".

With a working title of "Golden Mozzies", the show was intended to spend three months looking at the "shining lights" of Maori success, in an "informative, yet entertaining and inspirational observational series".

About $420,000 of taxpayer money was spent on the reality show, which follows the lives of seven New Zealanders chasing fame, money and sex in the Gold Coast.

NZ On Air today decided to release the proposal for the show , saying it had the aim of showing "positive, confident Maori in prime time on a commercial channel".

The show drew more than 400,000 viewers in its first episode, but those figures plummeted in its second week when it only pulled in 289, 480 viewers.

Despite this, NZ on Air said The GC had continued to draw strong audiences but would assess the full results once the series had finished.

In the proposal it said while the series was mostly aspirational, it would also tackle the subjects' concerns about "how their life is perceived so negatively by those back home - commonly referred to as 'plastic' Maori, and apparently 'rolling in it'".

Among the proposal subjects was 32-year-old barber shop owner Carlos Bishop, and 29-year-old personal trainer and massage therapist William Gardner.

After just one year, Bishop's barber shop was so successful he was considering opening a franchise, and Gardner's story was to follow his struggle to juggle his massage therapy business with a personal need to further his education. Neither of those two are in the show.

A main character in the show, 23-year-old Tame Noema, was quoted in the proposal as being "all about the lifestyle".

"I moved to get amongst it because I'm all about the lifestyle… I gym it hard everyday… I go to the beach… I fit in here… they get me."

Of the seven young Maori highlighted in the proposal, Noema is the only one actually in the show.

The proposal said it was no coincidence that Maori were achieving success in the Gold Coast.

NZ On Air cited a 2006 global entrepreneurship monitoring report and said Maori represented 17.7 per cent of all entrepreneurial activity in New Zealand.

A Te Puni Kokiri study also quoted in the proposal returned figures that 29.9 per cent of New Zealand Maori thought their peers in the Gold Coast weren't committed to Maori culture.

The proposal said the "mozzies" shift to Australia was also part of the culture.

"Maori are a migratory people, having arrive from Hawaiki nearly eight centuries ago. In many respects, their moving to Australia could be seen as part of this migratory pattern."

- © Fairfax NZ News