Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has announced that rural and ethnic media outlets will be re-classified as essential services, if they are able to show they serve either a hard to reach or non-English speaking audience and follow health and safety best practice, to minimise the risk of spreading COVID-19.

Free Speech Coalition spokesman David Farrar says, “We are very pleased to see the Government acknowledge its initial ruling on the scope of essential media was wrong. The wider definition will allow difficult to reach, and non-English speaking communities to continue to receive news which they would otherwise have been cut-off from.”

“This takes away some the immediate urgency of our judicial review but we’re not ruling it out. We need to go back our donors and supporters, review the decision, and speak to our lawyers before we make decision.”

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