All happy with rugby broadcasting deal, says Key

The International Rugby Board (IRB) and broadcasters are comfortable with an agreement on local television coverage of the 2011 Rugby World Cup about to be signed, Prime Minister John Key says.

Yesterday Mr Key revealed the deal was likely to be signed this week and this morning added it was not materially different to the proposal previously publicised.

"The verbal assurances I had was everyone was comfortable from the IRB to the individual media outlets," he told reporters.

Mr Key leaves tomorrow for the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Trinidad and Tobago.

He expected the agreement to be signed in the next day or so.

Maori Television, TVNZ and TV3 put in a joint bid, backed by the Government, to cover all the World Cup matches.

Before that happened, Maori Television put in a controversial bid of its own, backed with taxpayer funds, and would have ended up competing with TVNZ.

Those bids were withdrawn and replaced by the joint bid with the matches shared between the broadcasters.

Sky TV has the international rights to the World Cup.