Bullying Your ABC
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Having satisfactorily completed its role in the dispatch of a prime minister last week, News Limited has redirected its firepower towards another pesky adversary — the left-leaning, incompetent, over-funded ABC and its soon-to-be-launched 24-hour TV news channel. In its main editorial today, The Australian lays into the ABC’s coverage of the Rudd downfall as the reason to ask “why the ABC should be allowed to take on another taxpayer-funded channel when the corporation plainly cannot manage the ones it already has Meanwhile, on the opposite page, the paper’s Janet Albrechtsen has also unleashed on the ABC’s forthcoming news channel. Under the heading ‘Sky shames the ABC’, she asks whether the ABC “has the energy and team spirit that kicks in so readily at its poor cable cousin at Sky?” No mention, in either of these attacks, of News Corp’s commercial interests — of its stake in Sky News or of its aggressive behind-the-scenes lobbying for Sky to take over the government-funded Australia Network, which beams Australian TV into the Asia-Pacific region and is currently run by the ABC. What we are watching here is a powerful organisation deploying its journalism to pressure a government into bowing to its commercial agenda, not coincidentally at a time when the government is heading towards an election and needs all the supportive tabloid media coverage it can get. The ABC is too important to Australia to be kicked around as a pawn in a power game designed to bully the federal government into toeing the News Limited line. |
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28 Comments
Quite frankly, the ‘attack’ by the Australian on the ABC’s coverage of the developing Rudd downfall drama is just another bout of nauseating self-congratulation by the Murdoch empire. Fact is, they didn’t break the story, the ABC did, and that’s what stuck in their craw.
Didn’t see the article but isn’t Janet Albrechtsen still on the ABC board? I suppose if she doesn’t like what they are doing then she only has herself to blame.
I hate to interrupt your self-rightous anger, but take a good hard look at the most recent Media Watch episode for a forensic analysis and disection of how badly ‘your’ ABC dropped the ball on the coverage.
http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transcripts/s2939110.htm
The analysis points out a litany of missed opportunities, technical stuff-ups and how the organisation that broke the story first then failed to adequately follow up, leaving it to Sky News to make the running on the biggest Australian political story of the year.
This is the organisation that already swallows a significant amount of our tax dollars and who is angling for even more, failing to deliver on their mandate to deliver news of relevance to all Australians, in a timely and accurate manner.
I think that Sky did a noteworthy job on a hot story, while the ABC couldn’t capitalise on a story that should have been theirs for the taking, but which they fumbled badly.
The ABC lately, appeared to have been following in the footsteps of the News Ltd empire, with their biased political coverage of the day to day happenings in Canberra and beyond. Many many bloggers have commented that the ABC seem to have taken a pro Opposition stance in their news and current affairs stories both on radio and TV.
Now the Murdoch press turn their barrels on the would be imitators.
Why the Govt has not terminated the services of the likes of Albrechtsen on the ABC Board doesn’t make sense. She has never been anything but a Liberal Party hack and her writings in the Australian, rarely are anything but attacks on individual Ministers or Govt policy. She had an obvious hatred of Kevin Rudd and I am amazed why he didn’t instruct the Communications Minister to sort the ABC Board out escapes me. Howard did and swiftly.
Untilthe election is done, News Ltd will be doing their utmost to ensure an Abbott victory.
@David I believe her fixed term on the ABC board has been completed. Terms were fixed to avoid as much as possible the unseemly appearance of interference your scenario of a swift firing of her would have resulted in.
She probably had no influence on operational matters, and so could be seen as the usual ineffectual duffer one likes on a board. Or was she as the employee of a rival organisation party to a raft of commercial in-confidence information about the launch of the news channel? Of course as a scrupulous person she would have absented herself from all such discussions.
I don’t understand what all the fuss is about - the only people who read The Australian are other journalists. Normal people read the Farfax press or the Telegraph or the Herald Sun or MX.
Is that why Albrechtsen was on Q&A the other night?
To show off her “coat of many colours”, to the world?
Her new “impartiality” outfit -“pubicly contradicting” her “Cousin Jethro” a couple of times - a grab for what she sees will pass for some sort of cred - for this sort of launch on behalf of her “fearless leader” in his grab for more power, and influence, or to bat down some “up-start challenge”?
After all that work, and all those “Howard Media Ownership Laws”? “For nothing………?”
During the GFC (and after the banks were bailed) their cry went up that the market should have been left to work it’s way out - and a few, “well placed”, moguls could have snapped up a few bargains while that played out too?
You can imagine the sort of “news” “Comrad Rupert” would be scatting around the neighbourhood, the ABC is looking at, after it’s been Right through their collective media alimentary tracts.
And complaint about the sort of media control, totalitarian regimes have to suffer - from one controlled by their “Right Winged Warrior” regime?
So let this market work itself out!!!!!
@ Holden Back…love your work “Of course as a scrupulous person she would have absented herself from all such discussions.” wonderful
Lets hope the ABC 24-hour news is left alone by the Murdock press, surely the government can do something about, can’t they? Most people have woke-up to the fact the press is bias towards Labor so it may not make a difference, one can only HOPE.
@Michael James. What a load of self-serving hogwash. See Margaret Simons article in this issue of Crikey for a full rebuttal.
Yes, but….. How to explain the constant little death- by- a- thousand- cuts nflicted on Kevin Rudd, by the ABC?.eg: the transcript of his interview with Kerry O’rien, as Bernard Keane wrote, with every Primeministerial hesitation, evry audible pause, all lovingly notated. None, apparently on Mr Rabbit’s transcripts. And the relish with which several current affairs hosts and reporters regaled listeners that could be damging to Kevin Rudd.
AS an ardent fan of the ABC from way back,I cannot recall any thing like this occurring. Not even during the Keating years- although I do remember thinking that the press gallery positively fawned on Keating; no doubt wisely , given his merciless tongue.
So, where did the directive come from to ‘get’ Kevin Rudd at all costs?
@ Birdie. What exactly did I say that was self serving? I do not work for the ABC, Sky or News Corp and have nothing to gain from the issue.
The ABC had a breaking story on an issue of national significance, but then dropped the ball, leaving it to Sky News to pick it up. This was a significant failure by the national broadcaster.
Simons herself highlights the ‘disappointing performance’ of the ABC in covering the Gillard challenge. She attempts to justify Phillip Adams not breaking into the story, however he is running a live show, surely the best possible position to swiftly change to cover a major story, however either he or his producers news instincts let them down badly.
Just because it is a former member of the ABC Board that many here despise because of her political stance making a point, does not mean that she is incorrect in pointing out that the ABC had a political news scoop of monumental proportions, but failed to capitalise on it, leaving the way clear for Sky to set the pace.
I don’t care if the story is a little late. I was getting it all on ABC radio anyway. All I want is a factual report to summarize once the dust has settled. No opinionated dramatized bias reporting. And from what I can see the ABC, although it has its faults, gets closer to the mark than the commercial stations.
Dear Michael James, You don’t have to have a vested monetary interest in any of the organisations for your comments to be self-serving. Your interest is in canning and caning the ABC, and praising the Murdoch empire; your comments served that interest. For mine, I obtained quite enough information from the ABC that night to know what was going on. Although I didn’t watch the Sky News coverage, it was no doubt short on real time knowledge of what was happening, long on speculation and a great opportunity for the usual suspects to repeat their tired opinions (which by the way happened ad nauseum on ABC 1 and radio the following morning); though of course I shouldn’t speculate myself! I don’t think most punters, even the ones that watch the thankfully ad-free ABC like myself, want the set taken over completely by political shenanigans. I have absolutely no doubt that when the ABC News channel does start, it would respond in the same way as Sky News did. As Margaret Simons rightly points out, Sky News is dedicated to News 100 percent of the time, and responded as it should have. Don’t forget all you Murdoch apologists that the ABC broke the story. If Sky was on the ball and in the know, it should have won that prize. It didn’t.
Frankly, I, and 99% of the population thought there was far too much coverage on the ABC of any kind.
Sorry, I don’t think “who’s doing what to whom” counts as “news”. The ABC shoulds stick to car prangs and gangsters like the commercial TV - that’s what people _actually_ want.
And _local_ content. Not going into boring detail everytime some failed lawyer in Canberra has a rant, or some rich twat in Sydney gets a sprained ankle.
Not only are the mining multinationals plundering Australian resources now the principal media thug is bent on stuffing up the taxpayers’ broadcaster.
These bullies may overstep themselves any minute now.
Well, I was listening to Phillip Adams on the night in question, and thought he did all that could be done. There was no hard news, just rumours at the time. What is he (or the rest of the ABC, or the other networks) supposed to do… drop all scheduled programming and run non-stop speculation and expert analysis of the speculation for the rest of the night?
Did The Australian website dump it’s main content and post minute-by-minute updates of the not-quite-breaking-but-possibly-or-maybe-not news? I doubt it, and I wasn’t about to sit up through the night to find out.
JA is unbelievably hypocritical and one-eyed on most topics, and this is no exception.
You can all continue to hold hands in your leftie anti-News ltd circle, conjouring up all sorts of murky goings on and conspiracies to destroy the foundations of our democracy, or you can admit the obvious fact - that the ABC coverage of the story was crap - outperformed even by the dead carcases of the news divisions of the commercial media.
If ever there was a signal that ABC News must lift its game, this was it.
@David Hand. Saying it doesn’t make it so. There was nothing wrong with the ABC coverage, given that ABC 1 is not a dedicated news channel as Sky News is. Sky missed the boat on the night and after it caught up, spent the rest of the evening doing exactly what it should. When the ABC News channel starts, it can be expected to more than give Sky a run for its money, which of course is what scares the Murdoch empire witless, hence Janet A’s rather bizarre story today. Bring it on!
Birdie,
Is Media Watch a stooge for News Ltd as well?
ABC does have a dedicated news channel. It’s called News Radio. It spent the evening updating its 32 listeners about the government of some obscure central asian republic. Which of course, is why it has only 32 listeners. (Estimated ratings for news radio is a blind guess by me, but 32 is probably not far off the mark).
I saw Albrechtsen in the flesh on Q & A for the first time this week, and all she seems to be is an apologist for anyone who sees climate change as an attitudinal folly and who seems to reflect that anything touched by the hand of a working person, (which she clearly isn’t), is somehow infected with something catching.
There was nothing she said which added to a particularly good debate (irrespective of the presence of B Joyce, nincompoop). I think if you really want to see her in full yap, get her on a stage with Fred Nile, which will give her a point to genuflect towards, and give him someone (at last), who will agree with him.
@Michael James, I trust you emailed Jamie P to notify him of your dribble here, so he can perhaps keep you on a little longer, just in case those around who can actually think feel it may be fun to encourage you, and watch the results. As long as you and those who tug your leash (Packer/Fairfax/Mining), keep trying to screw with the population, there will be knots of folks just as keen to get up your nose.
David Hand,
Try as you might, the fact remains, Sky News ran a long second on this story. ABC News Radio isn’t broadcast where I live, so you might be right, but really the debate here is about TV. Sky News, a dedicated full-time news channel, supposedly on the pulse, missed the scoop.
As for Media Watch, it can be wrong, and in my considered opinion it was wrong in this case. Everyone here is comparing apples with oranges. It is simply not appropriate or fair to compare the roles of ABC 1 and Sky News, yet ABC 1 got the scoop. To then expect that somehow it should respond like Sky News is to misunderstand the proper roles of the two outlets. In my view ABC 1 on that night provided timely and accurate reporting of the facts as they came to hand. The embellishments on Sky News were great for political tragics, but quite unnecessary for the rest of us.
A News Limited attack on the ABC is just the sort gingering-up they need.
Hopefully it will encourage Auntie to expose rather than emulate N-Ltd bias.
Bring it on.
The attack on the ABC by the Australian has been happening for years. It is how the News Ltd groupies show how much they fear the power of a decent news service which is liable to show them up.
@BIRDIE@ZUT and like minded others - I agree! I just wish the ABC would stop acting like a continued ‘arm’ of msm and be independent? If I want to find out the news from the perspective/self serving interests of corporate wealth, I’ll read one of Murdoch’s rags and watch commercial TV. Idespair! Get rid of the pro Howard people from the ABC Board, remind the ‘workers’ who’s paying their salaries, and start acting like journalists who are proud of their profession.
I’m just sick and tired of the smart one-liners from Janita on the 7pm TV news. I just want the news to be reported - is that too much to ask? I don’t want to listen to a journalist flirting with Abbott or asking pro Coalition stupid questions? Or taking the US line on foreign policy etc - if I just want to hear that, I’ll get pay TV(if I could afford it) and watch Faux!
@ Ian
>>>I don’t understand what all the fuss is about - the only people who read The Australian are other journalists. Normal people read the Farfax press or the Telegraph or the Herald Sun or MX.
Unfortunately in many parts of the country - such as where I live - there simply are no other options to News Corp newspapers: it owns the lot, from local to regional, state to The Australian.
The local ABC likes to ‘report what’s in the newspapers’ (ie approved News Corp stories). So that’s that for diversity.
Unfortunately, steered no doubt by the likes of Albrechtsen, the ABC has become such a timid, conformist, biased and pre-disgested source of news and current afairs that I’ve lost much of my enthusiasm for supporting it.
Even so, another 24 x 7 TV news channel in Australia is a good idea, if only so News Corp doesn’t have 100% dominance in that field as well.
I’d prefer the Russians or Iranians to run it - then we might get real glasnost and balance. But that’s unlikely. The ABC is probably the logical choice.
Ah I understand where you are coming from Birdie.
You’re part of that loud and opinionated “Friends of the ABC” crowd that see Murdoch’s hand in every criticism and refuse to believe that the ABC can learn anything from a commercial media outlet.
You accuse me of “canning and caning the ABC, and praising the Murdoch empire”.
Bullshit, I expected the only national free to air publically owned broadcaster to use its resources to cover a news event of national significance.
When I first heard of what was happening, I instinctively turned to the ABC to learn what was happening, and found that ABC TV wasn’t reporting it. I then went to ABC radio and the ABC website, once again to find almost nothing.
Instead I ended up trolling the free to air stations and eventually pay TV to get an ongoing summation of the nights events.
That is the issue, not the pushing or otherwise of the supposed Murdoch agenda, of which I couldn’t care less.
The ABC failed to capitalise on the greatest political story of the year, despite having the scoop. That is the issue, not your stupid conspiracy theories and baseless accusations.
@ Michael James.
Yes, I am an ABC supporter, but am not a member of Friends of the ABC or their crowd, which you kind of imply.
In the ‘loud and opinionated stakes’ you leave me for dead. You may be unhappy about how the ABC performed on the night in question, I wasn’t, and reserve the right to defend the ABC against all comers.
That is not to say that I slavishly support every thing they do, I don’t. I agree with Liz45 that too much gratuitous ad hoc ‘colour’ is thrown in with what should be straight reporting.
For example, Juanita Phillips on the 7 pm News last night prefaced a story on a Government report with words similar to ‘If it can be believed’….
I do apologise if I conflated your attack on the ABC with the theme of the Crikey editorial. However, the strength of your opinion leads me to doubt that you could find anything good to say about the ABC no matter what…..