Matthew Abraham: Journalists need creative ways to slice through the spin. Gotcha questions one tool in the toolkit

‘Gotcha’ questions has been derided in the wake of Albo’s epic stuff up. But a good gotcha question can actually help journalists punch through the spin pollies use to avoid scrutiny, writes Matthew Abraham.

Gotcha. It’s hard to beat a killer Gotcha Question in an election campaign, it livens things up no end.

While the spoil sports can tut-tut about journalists setting trip-wires for politicians - asking them questions the rest of us think we can answer off the top of our heads - the gotcha occupies a proud place in the media arsenal.

Labor leader Anthony “call me Albo” Albanese may have a very different view.

His election campaign was barely 24 hours old last Monday when he collapsed in a heap over two questions central to his campaign – on interest rates and unemployment.

When asked if he knew the jobless rate, he answered: “The national unemployment rate at the moment is .. uh .. I think it’s 5.4 … sorry, I’m not sure what it is.”

If you missed it, you missed an excruciating 11 seconds of TV. The rate on Monday was four per cent. It’s hardly been a closely guarded secret.

Midway through the jobs stumble, he stuck his tongue out, as if he hadn’t already given the Coalition’s campaign dirt unit plenty of compost to spread all over social media.

The fact his shadow finance minister Senator Katy Gallagher stepped up to the cameras with the correct answers only accentuated his boo-boo.

Within minutes, one meme circulating via SMS portrayed him as the hapless Sergeant Hans Schultz from Hogan’s Heroes, with the trademark words “I know nothing”.

Another had Ms Gallagher as Batman, slapping Mr Albanese, aka the Boy Wonder, over the back of the head with the words: “It’s 4 per cent, Dickhead!”

Midway through his jobs stumble, Labor leader Anthony Albanese stuck his tongue out, giving the opposition dirt unit plenty of fodder for social media, writes Matt Abraham.

The usual rusted-on Labor luvvies on social media are up in arms over these gotcha questions, dredging up all kinds of fine details about cash rates and jobless figures they say no mere mortal could possibly have at their fingertips. Bad luck.

In case they hadn’t noticed, politics is a cruel, unfair and unforgiving business, and always has been.

A decent gotcha question can both test the mettle of a leader and punch through the dense fog generated by all major political parties to avoid scrutiny.

They say they want voters to focus on substance, not personalities, but the reverse is true. Journalists need to find creative ways to slice through the spin.

Or, as Blondie’s Deborah Harry sang, “one way or another, I’m gonna find ya, I’m gonna get ya, get ya, get ya, get ya”.

In a previous life on radio, I had been known to ask a few “gotcha” questions, quite a few to be frank, maybe too many to be brutally honest, and these possibly derailed the odd political career.

In 2006, mere months away from being rolled as Labor leader by Kevin Rudd, the gaffe-prone Kim “Bomber” Beazley, now governor of WA, dropped into Adelaide for a meeting of his shadow ministry. On the ABC, I asked the Oxford-educated Rhodes scholar to name the party’s SA Senators. He struggled to name just four of the five, but assured us “they’re actually doing extremely well”.

A gotcha question? Of course, but a fair one. He was in town to spruik his Senate wannabes. You’d expect he’d at least know their names.

In 2005, former Crows star Nigel Smart was preselected to run for the Liberals in Norwood, now Dunstan, in the 2006 state election.

He lived in Glenelg but suggested he was familiar with the many joys of life in and around The Parade. I asked him if he’d visit the Orange Lane Markets and he indicated he sure would.

The only problem was the much-loved markets had vanished about a year before, making way for a Centrelink office block.

Former Crows star and one-time political candidate Nigel Smart.

It wasn’t quite as painful as walking on hot coals at a Crows camp, but it came close.

Nigel didn’t win the seat from Labor’s Vini Ciccarello, a shame for the Liberals as he would have made a fine leader and future Premier. Did the Orange Lane gaffe cost him a win? We’ll never know, but it wouldn’t have helped.

It’s often said Kim Beazley was the best Prime Minister Australia never had, and there’s truth in that.

This is the downside to gotcha questions. They can knock out the very best and brightest, simply because they have a brain freeze in the wrong place at the wrong time.

During the week, one cartoonist penned a sketch showing a journalist rushing to a press conference, carrying a large jar of jelly beans.

How many beans in the jar, Albo? It may yet come to that.