What did Four Corners know and when did they know it?
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On 26 April Four Corners put to air a program “A Lethal Miscalculation”, about the Government’s insulation program. The program concentrated on the death of Matthew Fuller, who died from electrocution in October 2009. His girlfriend, Monique Pridmore, was seriously injured as well. The program purported to reveal that the Government had wilfully ignored multiple warnings about safety in the administration of the program, in favour of rapid rollout to support jobs during the GFC-induced economic slowdown. Many of the claims centred on allegations made by a Departmental whistleblower. This was probably — given how rare APS leakers are — the same whistleblower who sold the Herald-Sun a load of garbage back in February. In that story, it was claimed Garrett had ignored “hundreds” of emails about safety issues — although this then turned out to be that a senior bureaucrat “who answered directly to the Minister” had received the emails, not the Minister himself. As any public servant worth their shiny backside knows, no bureaucrats answer directly to Ministers. They answer indirectly, through their own Public Service superiors and the minister’s own advisers and chief of staff. The confused Herald-Sun story might have alerted 4 Corners that their whistleblower was either so junior or new to the APS as to not understand the simplest management concepts, or knew less about the insulation saga than they claimed. Four Corners also relied extensively shadow minister Greg Hunt and on the grieving family of Mr Fuller, who blamed the Government for their son’s death. “The cost of the government’s home insulation program has been great,” reporter Wendy Carlisle said at the end of the program. “Lives lost. Houses razed. A massive clean up. And for the Fullers, there is only the government to blame.” Less than two weeks after the program aired, Fuller’s employer, QHI and its directors, father and son Christopher John and Christopher William McKay, were charged by Queensland authorities in relation to the incident in which Fuller and Pridmore were electrocuted. 4 Corners interviewed the older McKay for the program about the events leading up to Mr Fuller’s death, but McKay’s comments only served as a prelude to an extensive attack on the Government’s oversight of the program. Four days before the program aired, the report by former bureaucrat Allan Hawke into the program was released. The report received widespread coverage. 4 Corners ignored the report entirely, whilst complaining that Peter Garrett and Greg Combet had declined to be interviewed for the program. Crikey asked Four Corners whether the production team for “A Lethal Miscalculation” had read the report, and if so why it wasn’t mentioned. Executive producer Sue Spencer replied “the report was carefully read and its findings checked against the script of the program. Minister Combet refused to be interviewed by the program. The full Hawke report was provided on the Four Corners website.” Spencer also pointed to the report’s conclusion that any replacement program should not proceed without a proper regulatory and compliance regime in place to ensure safety, and that given the priority of the rectification scheme the Government had put in place, consideration should be given to not proceeding with a replacement scheme. That seems to be Four Corners’ single take from the Hawke Report Crikey reader John Kotsopoulos complained about the program via the ABC’s laborious complaints assessment process (laborious chiefly because it was made that way to fend off persistent Coalition criticisms of bias). Kotsopoulos was also told that the Four Corners regarded those conclusions as, in the words of ABC Audience and Consumer Affairs’ Kieran Doyle, the “bottom line” of Hawke’s report. Four Corners appears guilty of cherry-picking. Hawke said in his report “any objective assessment of the HIP will conclude that, despite the safety, quality and compliance concerns, there were solid achievements against the program objectives” and, in relation to claims the program was “bungled”, “bungle is actually a furphy because the many positive outcomes (already and potentially) flowing from the [program] serve to address long standing problems besetting the industry.” This is because the industry was remarkably unsafe before the HIP program, with 20% of Queensland homes found to have pre-existing electrical faults, and at least 80 and probably more fires a year due to faulty installation of insulation. Far from neglecting to address safety issues in favour of rapid roll-out, Hawke says the relevant Department, DEWHA tried hard to address them through training and accreditation programs, but was let down by taking too long to undertake a by-the-book procurement process for a proper auditing and compliance system to vet installers, and by underestimating demand and the bureaucratic resources needed to oversee the program. As for the specific role of Garrett, “the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and the Arts was briefed on these issues and responses by both Mr Garrett and DEWHA were appropriate and timely.” Hawke went on to say “when issues arose, DEWHA and the Minister worked quickly to address them. DEWHA engaged with industry, listened to their concerns and briefed the Minister on necessary changes to the program. Warnings were heeded; however, this was largely reactive.” None of this is addressed in Four Corners, which made what in hindsight is a remarkable decision to ignore a key report on the exact issues it was making allegations about. 4 Corners preferred the unevidenced claims of a whistleblower over the independent review of an experienced ex-department head from the Howard era. One got an extensive interview, the other got stuck on the website. Asked why they cherry-picked the report in their justification, the ABC told Kotsopoulos “the ABC has noted the section of the Hawke report that you have highlighted [which I have quoted above]. However, it cannot agree that by not including that statement or focussing on that particular aspect of the report, that the broadcast lacked balance or unduly favoured any one view over another… balance was achieved in keeping with the Corporation’s editorial standards, through the presentation of a range of principal relevant perspectives. Audience and Consumer Affairs believes the broadcast is in keeping with section 5 of the ABC Editorial Policies.” At worst, Four Corners is guilty of selectively using evidence in a manner that is downright deceptive. I don’t think that was the case. More likely, I’d suggest, is that the Hawke Report didn’t fit the simple narrative Four Corners wanted to run — not so much because it found no evidence that either Garrett or DEWHA had failed to act on warnings (thereby entirely contradicting the claims of their “whistleblower”), but because it offered a complex story of what happened. The reasons why the program led to so many shonks badly installing insulation across the country lay not in simplistic stereotypes of bumbling bureaucrats or incompetent ministers, but in more complex issues: the designers of the program were worried about low take-up, and wanted to stimulate demand. A proper Commonwealth Procurement Guidelines-based tender process for a compliance and auditing mechanism took too long, because DEWHA didn’t want to cut corners (when, of course, corner-cutting is one of the things they’ve since been accused of). No one expected householders to so readily abrogate responsibility for what was going on in their ceilings because they had no money at risk. And senior officials didn’t swing extra resources into the relevant area quickly enough. None of that came through in Four Corners. It might have made for a less emotive and interesting program, but it would have done a better job of informing viewers of what really happened. |
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21 Comments
Barracking - or more excuses!
Mr Lewis have YOU read the Hawke Report? Please do. There is a particluar bit that applies to you and people of yor ilk:
“It may be a peculiar Australian trait to bank or play down good news while examining the entrails of shortcomings in minute detail. Such is the case here, as the success of measures to deal with the global financial crisis risk having some shine taken off them by the so called HIP bungle. Bungle is actually a furphy because the many positive outcomes (already and potentially) flowing from the HIP serve to address long standing problems besetting the industry. “
(p viii)
http://www.environment.gov.au/minister/garrett/2009/mr20091221.html
That happens when you don’t clean out the rightards implanted during the howard years. The ABC is surely at its lowest point in history. A lesson to be learnt for any none conservative government, don’t forget the broom whenever you get the power. The shit left behind by howard is really starting to stink.
OK I accept the above as no doubt an accurate asessment of the scheme. So why did the PM make a scapegoat of Peter Garrett? Answer no doubt, political expediency. When he couldn’t get traction with the media and opposition on the matter, Garrett had to go.
Can’t say that I was overly impressed with his acceptance of overall responsibility, that was self evident.
Once, 4 Corners was a viewing must. Is the programnow in decline?
The marketers have a word for it, the life of a product and perhaps 4 Corners has peaked and is coasting down hill in its pursuit a good, popular story..
I actually don’t agree that rightards (thanks, Phil) are to blame. The ABC’s news and current affairs programs have, during the past decade or so, drifted away from presenting reasoned argument to build their storyline, instead going for the intellectually lazy quick story which has been stripped of inconvenient facts.
Any blame should be spread far wider, to consumers of the news and CA products who gobble up brain dead stuff as though it was the full story, to Murdoch’s press and their campaigning style which ignores much of the known universe, and many more besides. True analysis can be rare indeed.
I have no quick and easy repair mechanism, but if you find yourself screaming at the TV some evening “You dumb presenter! How about telling the whole story! Life just ain’t that simple!” then you will know where I am coming from.
Perhaps with the planned introduction of a 24-hour news channel, Auntie will find room for deeper analysis, but I doubt it. I fear that it will consist entirely of looped repeats of 2-minute items.
Stephen Martin Peter Garrett was interchanged because he was a lightning rod for the media frenzy. Nothih he did would have been seen as being good enough. The job administering the rectification work was seen to be a better fit for the skills that Greg Combet undoubtedly possesses.
John Kotsopoulos your first two sentences to me above seem to make my point also - political expediency.
As for Greg Combet we will have to wait and see; certainly he has quite a rep. I seem to recall talk of him as a future Prime Minister when he left his union position to enter Parliament.
Its sobering to think how low the ABC has fallen. It used to be the byword of impartial, reliable reporting, now programs like 4 Corners are slow moving, factless emotional pap. Good journalism with 4 briskly moving articles can be found on Landline.
I am not a journalist, I can be emotional.
@John Bennetts
I agree entirely.
@John Bennetts
You don’t agree about the rightards in the ABC, and then you actually nail my point by comparing our near dead Aunty to Murdoch’s News (very) Ltd. If Murdoch and News aren’t the world’s lowest common denominator in the rightardation of gullible public, who are? Thanks for confirming my hypothesis. If it looks, sounds and craps like a duck!
I don’t understand.
Why were people electrocuted? Is it something to do with our education system???
John Kotsopolous; I wonder if you will be prepared to declare your interest in this topic.
I made a complaint some time ago to Fran Kelley’s morning program. I had a response from her producer basically telling me there was nothing wrong with the particular comment and anti Labor comments by Kelly generally and they were not interested in my views. I had copied in the complaints department.
I eventually received a reply from them denying the comments had been made.
I forwarded the reply I had received from the producer the day after the comments were made.
The person handling my complaint replied by saying that as the producer was not allowed to reply to me, his views were not valid, even though he had agreed the comments had been made. The ABC’s position was no comment had been made but they did not deny the producer had defended the comment.
They have since refused to reply to any request for a review.
Our ABC at work. The 4 Corners attitude does not surprise me, it pervades the whole of the ABC. Rudd should do what Howard did, teach them not to bite the hand that feeds them.
Rena, people were (and are still) electrocuted because many, many houses have been and are being built with fatal flaws in their design and especially workmanship - particularly in the ceiling space. Most will never, ever be discovered. Hardly anyone ever climbs into the ceiling space of their own home - it’s difficult, it’s dark and you’re likely to damage something or put your foot through the gyprock ceiling. This partly explains why, in a recent north Queensland survey about home insulation by the electricity supplier Ergon, 20% of respondents did not know whether their house had any insulation.
If electrical wiring is not fully contained within a proper conduit (a common occurrence in ceiling spaces that I have looked in) then it is always possible that it can be ‘found’ by drills and other tools - especially in the last 30 years since these battery-powered tools have really proliferated. Lax (state) standards and (local government) non-policing has meant that house fires and electrocutions have stayed below the radar until a suitably naive and unsuspecting government program has come along to dump the entire blame on.
Pedant’s corner: Bernard wrote: “…charged by Queensland authorities in relation to the incident in which Fuller and Pridmore were electrocuted”. Electrocute means to “kill by electricity”. If a person does not die, then at least in relation to that person, it is not electrocution.
Kevin Herbert I have no interest to declare. I have never been a member of any political party. I just hate to see the ABC hunting with the media jackals or see it become a taxpayer funded Fox News.
BTW have YOU read the Hawke Report, do you agree with the way it was used by 4 Corners and what is YOUR interest?
The present private media scramble, present company excluded, now pied pipering the public ignorance which the mining baron’s filthy lucre is funding, is an embarrassment and a shameful period in our history.
For the ABC to fall prey to the sensational over stating of the obviously flawed nonsense that is truly the essence of propaganda is just bewildering. Can it be the staff at the ABC are that desperate to gain favour for hire in the private sector? For them to appear so gullible and naïve can only mean they’re also chasing the fool’s gold offered by the multination puppet masters. It seems even our democracy is also up for sale in this GFC. Has it come to this that everything is on ebay and goes to the highest bidder these days? When it comes rightards it’s all up for grabs, their own ignorant souls where bought long ago it seems.
Dr Harvey M Tarvydas
BK, ripper!
@PHIL “That happens when you don’t clean out …” – you’re right, it’s a problem of politicization of the public service (the fiendish side of the PM Howard), but I am not talking about the ABC here.
JOHN BENNETTS – his comments are right, most media in Aus seem to be loosing the special things that go to ‘quality’ which seems not to be the 1st prerogative any longer. In the ABC it may be the effect of being surrounded by ‘shit’ when it takes awesome talent to maintain standards in a smelly environment.
On insulation. (1) Some 30 years ago, in considerable detail, I advised the NSW DLI of the dangers of this materal being installed in roofs and to the best of myknowledge..as I never saw it again,…they got the point. I forecast the present eventualities and the causes.In 2009, appalled, I wrote a very pointed, detailed and stinging to the safety office in Qld as soon as I was notified of the first death. There was no reply. I wrote again on the third. There was no reply. Then came the fourth. Again I wrote…all to no apparent avail excepting that the matter was by then a scandal. The public knows little of the dangers and the dangers which will increase once metal insulation is installed. I have no floundering on this matter. Only corruption could have (re) introduced this totally unsuitable material for use. One has to seekout the actual basis of this whole event, where it started, who lobbied whom and “cui bono”. I was appalled to see Rudd become irritable and say “Oh…look,we are moving on ” when asked by a reporter about the deaths. This dreadful event which can in no way be excused is without doubt the most appalling event since Hawke (as I understand it) bought the spyware “promis” from the Israelis… other than both sides of parliament supporting the demonisation of Hussein and the lies concerning the genocidal invasion of Iraq followed by the Rudd/Gillard outspoken approving of the Israeli genocidal atrocities in Ghaza. It is not being properly investigated because political people simply ignore, when I tell them, that this metallic insulation has “a history. Does anyone really care other than the parents or is this “media archives” now?
Insulation (2)
The insulation documentary highlighted the nature of people who avail themselves of becoming contractors in such projects as this insulation..and I can add solar, another story. The electrician dummies seemed to know nothing. No one really cared enough. The kerfuffle over safety was so obfuscating that even the politicians missed the lack of safety when dealing the “bat” insulation Some had no masks…one had a mask which he pulled-down to speak and of all as I recall the union representative broke more safety rules than anyone else…it’s like a sort of zombie paradise when the media drags these people along to highlight some fault in our systems.
Since then…….I suspect from my conversations that there are people in departments concerned with the issues, perhaps overwhelmed that they didn’t do enough to stop the insulation rort and refuse to allow the metallic insulation to be used. It’s very difficult to be a whistle blower, or ‘troublemaker” in a department as prosecution can follow.
Very, very, very, very expensive consulting companies have been used to manufacture a fairly tedious tender for the removing of the insulation.
The mattter was far more simple and could have been done at far less costs, in fact I could have done it better myself. I will not go into some of the startling information which came out of the tender but can say that no consideration was given, until I raised the issue, of the disposing of the material..the vast quantities, the likelihood of tips being overwhelmed, possibly rejecting it, the environmental effects of it..the possibility of dumping it and worse…the very strong likelihood of contractors being offered “peanuts” money by unscrupulous people.to avoid the tipping fees they are paid in the lump sum price and resell it for installation ..perhaps even offering an ‘electrical inspection” to go along with it” at a price still well below the norm. Even one eventof that is one too many.
The tender matrixfor the R and R of insulation and the electrical work was one which I saw as leading to poor workmanship in opportunism….bear in mind the opportunism and lack of quality so far… improperly based pricing and another scandalous cost to the taxpayer on top of the no doubt massive costs of getting the tender underway. Whilst perhaps at my nagging insistance the minister decided to have said that completly removing the metallic insulation was recommended there was as i recall no absolute doctrinaire statement I can also ask whay the supplier’s of the material have not been publicly identified and as I said in my earlier letter, the whole matter investigated because there will be quite a fascinating lobby history leading up to the decision of Rudd to have it installed. I add that relying on “Peak Bodies” influenced by contractor’s associations is as fraught with danger as is relying on all the contractors and their employees to be competent at their licensed work.
The documentary gave some indication of that.
As I head towards closing, the ALP is in my estimation rather wisely, trying to move away from the image of being “union controlled”…To many people “being involved with unions” was a bad thing and certainly the corrupt employer’s organisms represented by the liberals made hay from it. I strongly support the concept of honest, strong, decent, forthright, impartial and powerful unionism respected in the community but that’s not we have these days. From my first exposure to it in the maritime union some 55 years ago to today I have seen my own become corrupted by partiality, paranoia, obsfuscation, self interest and arrogance. To some degree I could say they have become a sort of masonic lodge for the upper echelons of the working class, those who want to pretend their roots are no longer their roots… in which there are degrees of educational attainments, importance, and assistance depending on who you are and where you stand.
The union hierarchy which has become a part of Rudd’s “union houdini” are very competent men but I am afraid have lost their integrity and the insulation deal, from start to finish has been a disgrace on them and their weakness, political blindness, lack of care and treachery towards the whole of the community btut in particular to those who died. This is not my first experience with waht I call “union corruption” but I hope someone takes it up to those union hierarchy and askes..’where were you???” and harasses them until they are cornered.
It happened once to Barwick on a corruption issue, by a very clever journalist. Backed into a corner whence he could seemingly not escape, Barwick, was silent for a moment and realised his dilemma then turned to a basic dictum of logic and said “it’s a very good argument…but then..its only an argument”…and at that point of being able to dismatle Barwick the journalist gave up. Let’s hope that doesn’t happen with this insulation. Something of an odour is blowing across from the federal Denmark and it will be better for the ALP,undoubtedly create a beter ALP if all is disclosed by good investigative journalism and it isn’t simply “shelved”.
I think it important to add some comment to the letter from Charlie McColl, who raised some good issues. Conduit has rarely been used in ceilings since VRI but much more so TPS cable
came into general use. There are still times one uses conduit and there is nothing other than costs to prevent the use of it with building wire at any time. There is a flaw though, and Charlie may not be a sparkie….rigid steel conduit…which I used for my entire apprenticeship, would deflect a drill or make itself more obvious than the in contacting the thinner walled, often rusty, split steel conduit of the earlier period when double cotton covered and rubber sheathed cables were used on the road of evoluiton. It would not however prevent an earnest person drilling through it. It might then however…but there is no guarantee depending on the insulation penetrated, operate some protective device. Today in a ceiling space with no mechanical damage likely the wires inside the plastic sheath on TPS are deemed to be “in conduit”. If one uses tubular pvc conduit, little resistance will be experienced by a drill. That comparatively few people enter roof spaces in no way excuses the insulation debacle…or the rip offs. Some large% of the houses I inspected (properly) at innisfail, had serious faults existing and I notified all of them so hopefully they would be repaired by local sparkies. Were they?..who knows. If the story is “trying to dump something” on the federal Government over the insulation debacle I say, nonsense!!…the fact isthis. When I do a house or any building it is fault free. It has always been thus.I do a proper job in discussion with clients even on archtect designs and I always have done so. I accept that cowboys roam the range, and that has a lot to do with the poor quality average of todays ADHD-mobile phone frenetic apprentices which become tradesmen. I used to sometimes be asked to employ migrant electicians directly from the migrant accommodation and their work would make your hair stand on end…today we vet them better….I have seen appaling electrical work in my lifetime and as recently as last year was ripping out steel conduit all over the place on a construction site because of its devious and unsafe (improper) installation, a place being outfitted by the most wealthy and best known construction company in that region.I know of dangerous faults left in Sydney because in my reporting them it was uncovered major contractors had been allowed to get away with murder and everyone started to cover up.
As far as this documentary is concerned, it was a great expose of a serious problem. Yes it had serious defects which I have outlines but on a good V bad basis it was a laydown misere as being a winner.What those defects did was to highlight…for “those who have ears to hear and eyes to see”…the dreadful state on not only the government in its vulnerability to lobbyists but its ignoring of what I and others warned it about..one way or another…and if those warnings were not seen or not heeded then prosecutions of Departmental heads should already be underway.
This is a fact…I could have made it quite clear to the ALP where the dangers lay (as could other senior electricians and engineers like myself who do not go to water) in that scheme and made, were we forced to accept its continuing , a proper inspection and installation regime with a Quality Assurance which would have almost certainly prevented any deaths.
Perhaps for some 4 deatss in a few making a big quid for a few contractors and wages for some workers in billion dollar money hailstorms from the ACT, is not bad odds but I say that neither the article which initiated my letters here, not any other “expert” or other comment nor any ministerial tale excuses this appalling series of events in which the union officers under Rudd were derelict of duty to us all if they knew of it. Good on 4 corners…if they are running for cover then they don’t understand, themselves what a good service they did in exposing the rorts, the mindsets, the dangers and inadvertently, the careless or ignorent behaviour of people in the documentary who ought to have acted safely and shown good example.