“At least some of these agreements have enabled news businesses to hire additional journalists in particular and make other valuable investments to assist with their operations,” the report said.
“While views on the success or otherwise of the Code will certainly differ, we think it fair to conclude that the Code has been successful to date.”
The report mostly recommended that the government consider new ways of administering and assessing the effectiveness of the law, and did not suggest changing the law itself.
But it noted that the law lacked “a formal mechanism to extend the code to other platforms”, and suggested the government order the competition regulator, which led the law’s design, “to question to prepare the report”.
“The review shows that the code has been successful in balancing the bargaining power between news media and digital platforms,” said Stephen Jones, assistant treasurer.