Why the ABC distorts the news agenda

IT came as no surprise to be quoted by the extravagantly paid Tony Jones, the host of the ABC’s Green-Left oriented Q & A program, last Monday as he sought to justify the taxpayer-funded media organisation’s attack on Australian-Indonesian relations. Jones’ sniggering, simpering remarks are usually aimed at the luvvies and no doubt he hoped to embarrass me and all those in the media who believe that the national interest might just trump the public interest occasionally. During a program which featured an extraordinary riff about a truly inexplicable conspiracy theory from the human rights lawyer Julian Burnside, Jones reverenced my view in response to a serious question from Roslyn Coutinho, who asked: “The Australian public trust and value the ABC as a source of truth, however, the Indonesian phone tapping story could potentially have negative consequences for innocent parties, such as Australian cattle farmers and asylum seekers in Indonesia. So my question is for the whole panel, including Tony, but this could be wishful thinking, was the choice to run this story a selfish decision by the ABC or should governments be more careful about the potential implications of their intelligence operations in general? His reply, which must have been researched and prepared in advance, was: “I might answer your question by quoting News Limited columnist Piers Akerman who wrote last year, ‘I believe freedom is absolute. You either have a free press or you do not.’ The information came to the ABC, they published it. I wonder whether News Limited would have published it or held it? That’s a very interesting question we probably won’t know the answer to.” The quote is accurate, although it came from a blog written on March 18 this year, not last. But Jones was, as usual, a little too smart. He needs to be reminded of the context of the quote and it was this — and I shall now quote from blog which the ABC employee found irresistible. “It would not be news to readers of this site that this dysfunctional government’s ham-fisted attempts to muzzle the media anger me. “Unfortunately, I permitted that anger to show on the ABC’s Insiders program yesterday. “Flanked by two people who laughed at the notion that press freedom was threatened, and mocked by the show’s host, I raised my voice. “Perhaps I should not have. “I was angered by their naiveties, by their apparent belief that freedom can be trifled with. “I believe freedom is an absolute. “You either have a free press or you do not.” And I still believe that. The point that needs making for people like Jones however, who are more than willing to play the idiot if they think it will portray conservatives in a poor light, is that even a free press must be responsible. While the US Constitution goes further than any other to enshrine the notion of free speech, US law (and commonsense, a trait obviously absent from the halls of the ABC) make it a crime to recklessly falsely shout “fire” in a crowded venue. Jones, of course, was only trying to justify the decision taken by the ABC to promote The Guardian’s publication of intelligence material stolen from the United States by the defector Edward Snowden, now living in Russia where he enjoys the hospitality of that nation’s security services. No doubt the Russians will keep him a long way from their computers but whether Snowden, The Guardian and the ABC would ever dream of publishing documents that would damage the national interests of Russia, is as Jones’ might muse “a very interesting question we probably won’t know the answer to”. I would hazard a guess though that The Guardian would not release such material because it is not interested in exposing Russian secrets, only those which would damage the web of Western nations which share democratic values. As an Australian, I have no qualms considering the national interest. The Guardian was always going to publish the material stolen by the defector, but I question the need for “our” ABC to assist that media group in promoting the damaging allegations in our region. If the ABC was truly interested in freedom of the press, I would never have had to challenge Insider host Barrie Cassidy last March, or later in the year when I asked why the ABC had so consistently failed to broadcast any news about the ongoing Victorian police investigation into former Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s involvement as a lawyer in helping to set up the AWU Workplace Reform Association (which she later described as a “slush fund") and providing legal advice to her former boyfriend Bruce Wilson and AWU member Ralph Blewitt. Ms Gillard has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. The case will be given yet another airing in the Victorian courts tomorrow, though whether the ABC breaks with its habit and reports this is “a very interesting question we probably won’t know the answer to”. Meanwhile, the ABC continues its attempts to smear the Abbott government over the spying allegations. On Wednesday, the AM program began its report of the Indonesian response to Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s letter to Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono thus: “Mr Abbott’s initial refusal to explain documents showing Australia spied on the President, his wife, and senior ministers, angered Indonesia, causing the President to suspend cooperation.” Get it? Most reasonable people would think the Indonesians were angered by the spying but the ABC wants its audience to see Abbott as the villain. The ABC sucks more than $1 billion from the taxpayers. What’s more, Labor rewarded it for its support with more money and was prepared to twice ignore a tender process and award it with the Australia Network to pursue “soft diplomacy” on Australia’s behalf in our region. The ABC is a bloated failure in the hands of ideologues. It should be stripped back to its charter, at the very least, or broken up and sold, if possible to commercial interests. In a world of expanding media, the notion of a taxpayer-funded national broadcaster is anachronistic. Those who want to keep “our” ABC, should fund it. Those who don’t should not have to pay for it.