Up to 20 roles across Nine’s TV news and current affairs division will be axed in a restructure from the media giant.
The changes form part of Nine’s multi-year “Future News” transformation, which will impact all roles across the division and run through to the end of the 2028 financial year.
The first phase of redundancies will affect up to 20 positions within a workforce of around 800 staff nationally, with voluntary redundancies expected to be offered.
The cuts follow earlier reductions flagged late last year, when Nine announced up to 50 roles would be axed across its streaming and broadcast division.
Under the latest restructure, more than 100 existing job titles across news and current affairs will be reduced to just nine broader roles, including story editor, digital story editor, rundown editor and multimedia journalist.
Newsrooms in Sydney and Canberra, foreign bureaus and the Today show – which employs around 315 staff – are among the first areas to enter consultation.
In a note to staff following a town hall briefing, Executive Director of News and Current Affairs Fiona Dear said the scale of the changes would be felt across the entire division.
Love Film & TV?
Get your daily dose of everything happening in music, film and TV in Australia and abroad.
“We’ve said from the beginning that this will touch all roles in some way, shape or form,” she said.
“To leverage the new technology, workflows, and the story-centric model, we must evolve our structure and the roles we perform within that structure.”
Dear sought to frame the changes as an industry-driven shift rather than a cost-cutting exercise.
“This isn’t about doing the same work with fewer people to save money; it’s about acknowledging that the work itself is changing across our industry and we must adapt to survive and thrive,” she said.
“I want to be very clear that cost is not driving our decision-making.”
Sources have told Mediaweek that while the team have known the changes were coming “for a while,” the “transparency is kind of refreshing even if it is worrying”.
Nine said it has been investing in new technology, training and equipment as part of the Future News project, which aims to modernise production and enable new commercial opportunities.
“We’re investing heavily in this project – in new technology, training, equipment, and in our people,” Dear said.
“Future News will also deliver growth and revenue opportunities for us as we find new ways to commercialise our content on different platforms.”
However, she acknowledged efficiencies would come with the transformation.
“As we’ve said, all roles are touched by this program of work… we anticipate approximately 20 fewer roles will be required in our first market,” she said.
The formal consultation process is now underway for Sydney News, the Video Content Team, Today, Canberra and foreign bureaus, and is expected to take up to four weeks.
Employees will go through team briefings, followed by one-on-one discussions, before final decisions are made.
Once implemented, the new structure will take effect on 5 August 2026 for most affected teams and on 21 October 2026 for the Today show.
Dear said the transition would fundamentally reshape how Nine produces and delivers news.
“The permanence and depth of the change we’re delivering will fundamentally alter the way we produce and deliver news at Nine,” she said.
Dear acknowledged the disruption but positioned the shift as necessary.
“Future News is a bold and ambitious transformation program,” she said.
“This program is going to stretch us all in new ways and will fundamentally change the things we know and have done for decades.”
From Mediaweek