ABC board member Joe Gersh concedes the public broadcaster needs more conservative voices

ABC board member Joe Gersh says it is moving journalists out of woke inner-city neighbourhoods to provide a broader perspective.

ABC board member Joe Gersh. Picture: Aaron Francis

ABC board member Joe Gersh has admitted the public broadcaster needs a larger cohort of conservative voices. But he said the organisation is in the process of shifting journalists outside of inner-city areas to get broader views into its reporting.

The Melbourne-based businessman, who has been on the board since 2018, said the public broadcaster needed to steer away from having too many left-leaning commentators and journalists.

“I do think the ABC has to be vigilant … there could be more diverse voices on the ABC, there could be more debate, there can be more conservative spokesmen,” he said on ABC Melbourne’s morning radio program hosted by Virginia Trioli.

“I do note that the ABC is at its best when it’s pursuing issues … and taking in all points of view.”

His comments came less than 24 hours after former Victorian Liberal Party president and ABC board member Michael Kroger unleashed on Sky News Australia over what he said was the bias against the Coalition within the ABC, described ABC chair Ita Buttrose as “a hopeless failure”.

“She should resign. She’s lost control of the ABC. It’s more biased against the Coalition than I’ve ever seen it. It’s worse than I’ve ever seen,” Mr Kroger said on Wednesday night.

Kroger said many of the ABC’s programs were shockingly one-sided including the weekly news and current affairs program Q+A, which he described as “political acid” against the Coalition.

Mr Kroger’s comments followed the defamation case brought against the ABC by Industry Minister Christian Porter over reports of rape allegations. Formal mediation in the case concluded this week.

But Mr Gersh said ABC reporters had to be “frank and fearless in holding those in power to account.

“These are very very serious allegations against a senior and very competent Minister … which he denies,” he said on air.

He also defended the ABC board, saying it was not “engaging in some kind of witch hunt against this government, or any other by the way. It’s just nonsense, it’s just not the case”.

Mr Gersh also said the ABC was looking to shift away from having most of its journalism staff in the inner-city areas of the capital cities to have them spread further into other parts of Australia.

“The ABC has a plan to take a good number of the content makers who currently sit at head office and move them elsewhere to more diversely represent what Australia is today, and so that there are different voices and different perspectives,” Mr Gersh said.

“It is true that if you are living in the inner urban areas of one of our capital cities you have a different perspective of people who might live in the regions where the ABC is hugely valued.”

In 2020 the ABC’s political programs The Drum and Insiders were found to lack conservative voices in their 2019 election coverage, but a major review – the Blackburn report – found the broadcaster met its impartiality standard.

Mr Gersh also defended the position of Ms Buttrose, who was appointed by the Coalition in 2019.

“The position ... respect in which Ita is held has not been diminished generally,” he said.

“People do understand that she understands the issues.”