Police Commissioner Karen Webb’s battle to control media message
Disastrous press conferences. Four media advisers in two years. Police Commissioner Karen Webb is a capable top cop — except for one key component of modern policing.
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It was a classic Sydney power lunch.
Gathered at a table at China Doll restaurant down at the Finger Wharf in Woolloomooloo were the who’s who of media, politics and business.
There was leading restaurateur Luke Mangan. Sydney media executives, including the editor of our sister publication The Daily Telegraph Ben English, and Nine Radio managing director Tom Malone.
Former police commissioner Mick Fuller was also at the table. They were later joined by former premier Dominic Perrottet, who had been having lunch at a separate table.
At one stage, television presenter Sarah Harris, News Corp columnist Joe Hildebrand and The Morning Show co-host Larry Emdur walked by.
At some point, the inevitable question came up: “Why Karen?”
Not since former Labor government appointed ex-British police officer Peter Ryan to the role of the NSW Police Commissioner in the wake of the explosive Wood Royal Commission into police corruption back in the late ‘90s has the top office, headed by Karen Webb, and its staff become embroiled in such controversy.
Unrealised ambitions, arch-rivals trying to settle scores, and a failure to engage those that pull the strings in Sydney have all been blamed for the cluster bomb that has exploded in the face of the Minns government.
Instead of crowing about the Coalition government’s apparent misfire at a senior planning officer who last week was cleared by ICAC of any alleged wrongdoing, Minns government ministers were once again dragged into a drama involving the top cop’s office.
In this case, questions over whether a TV producer had the job of Webb’s top media minder and how he got it.
Steve Jackson, a former magazine staffer who worked his way up through News Corp before leaping across to TV to join Nine’s 60 Minutes and then 7 News Spotlight.
Soon after the Saturday Telegraph flagged on “X” that “Jacko” was the likely replacement for sacked executive media director Liz Deegan, shots were being fired.
2GB’s Ben Fordham speculated on his program that the “colourful” media veteran could be let go before his duties are set to begin after Easter.
While declaring he did not personally know Jackson, Fordham said the choice had “raised a few eyebrows”, describing him as a “cowboy”.
“Most media types were surprised when Jacko was announced as the new right-hand man to Karen Webb,” Fordham said.
“She believes the force should be run as a modern corporate enterprise.
“Jacko, on the other hand, is old school — he works hard and plays hard.”
Jackson — the fourth media chief to be hired in the role — had somehow broken the number one rule of media advising of “not becoming the story” before day one of the job.
Fordham has made no secret how he feels about Webb, declaring soon after Deegan was dismissed that the police commissioner had “sacked the wrong person”, noting that Webb had even “outsourced” the dismissal to “someone else”.
The dismissal followed criticism of Webb’s handling of the fatal Clare Nowland tasering incident and the apparent reference to a Taylor Swift “haters gonna hate” lyric in a media interview where she attempted to defend her response to the alleged murders of Sydney couple Jesse Baird and Luke Davies.
“The NSW Police Commissioner should have sacked herself,” Fordham declared soon after Deegan’s dismissal.
“Instead, she threw a spin doctor under the bus and blamed Liz Deegan for her recent stuff-ups.”
Unlike the relationship the 2GB host had with former police commissioner Mick Fuller, that between the radio host and Webb is combative.
“Every time she goes on Fordham she gets savaged,” a senior government source said.
On top of Fordham’s prediction about Jackson, the veteran journalist has also been the subject of vicious whispering campaign with his selfies with former model Tziporah Malkah (formerly Kate Fischer) and Instagram posts by Bruce Lehrmann featuring Jackson in the back of a black convertible circulating among media outlets.
As News.com.au reported, Jackson, who quit his job at Seven in anticipation of taking on the role, was the senior producer on the Spotlight program that paid Mr Lehrmann’s rent for a year in exchange for an interview in which he denied raping Brittany Higgins.
Jackson also interviewed Malkah for a newspaper profile piece. But selfies taken by the former model during the course of the interview in her Kings Cross apartment have now resurfaced amid reports of Jackson’s “colourful past”.
“It’s ridiculous,” one Minns government adviser said, noting that Webb had the final say on who would be her minder.
“Everyone has enemies, right? But this is a total pile-on.”
While Fordham was calling for Webb’s head, his 2GB stablemate Ray Hadley was taking aim at Police Minister Yasmin Catley, claiming she was incapable of doing her job and needed to be “moved on”.
By Thursday, there were alleged leaks coming from NSW Police itself, with the focus shifting to an apparent rift between Webb’s and Catley’s offices after a police media liaison staffer was kept away from parliament.
A government source said it was “the opposite of the truth”.
Catley’s office also came under fire for releasing a statement that appeared to conflict with comments from the NSW Police on Jackson’s appointment.
However, it now appears Jackson is filling the role on a six-month interim basis, pending a “fuller” public recruitment position.
According to a former Liberal minister, the public may neither care nor understand what the controversy is about. Many believe Jackson is simply a proxy for those wanting to bring down either Webb or Catley — or both.
But having the issue dominate news pages and prime-time radio is problematic for a government whose ministers should be on air talking about its solutions to a regional crime wave, immigration and how it plans to bring down the cost of living.
“It means they’re not getting any time to get their message across,” the former minister said. “And every minor event becomes a story.
This was acutely apparent with former premier Mike Baird, who was clobbered for six hours every day by then 2GB host Alan Jones, followed by Ray Hadley, over greyhounds until the inevitable U-turn.
“You need to have one or the other on side,” the former minister said.
“Otherwise it’s all over, as Baird eventually learned.”
Unlike the relationship enjoyed by former police commissioner Mick Fuller and his then media minder Grant “Grunter” Williams, Webb remains steadfastly on the back foot with key media outlets.
Media, as Perrottet was acutely aware when he selected Webb for the job back in February 2022, was not her strong point.
And when a large part of the job is reassuring the public following the latest gangland shooting or murder, that is an issue.
While well respected within the NSW Police Force, Webb was largely unknown outside of the law enforcement.
It is understood the frontrunner for the job would have been the affable Deputy Commissioner David Hudson, only he never applied.
Those who did submit CVs had their issues.
It is understood assistant commissioner Mal Lanyon himself brought up the “elephant in the room” during his interview with the former premier – a story this newspaper broke of the now infamous “Big Merino” incident where he “shaped up” to an ambulance officer who was trying to assist him after he had collapsed “intoxicated” onto a footpath one night in Goulburn. Lanyon apologised, but Perrottet is understood to have been concerned about the incident becoming a distraction.
The other candidate was former deputy police commissioner Mick Willing, whose enthusiastic supporters — apparently Jones was among them — led to Perrottet allegedly questioning whether his number had been handed out, given the ferocious lobbying.
While loved, Willing also had his enemies – a concern for the then premier.
It had to be Karen.
Firm, friendly, but not familiar, Perrottet and then police minister Paul Toole decided they could help her improve her public profile by having her attend even the more mundane police press conferences. Toole would roll out the “lock ’em up” lines, while Webb would focus on the policing detail.
When Fuller got the top job, it is understood he received a call from a staffer in the office of then premier Gladys Berejiklian who ordered: “You’ve got to make good with (Alan) Jones and (Ray) Hadley.”
Fuller went further, reaching out to business leaders such as then Qantas CEO Alan Joyce to both network and learn from. The move did not stop combative interviews, but gave Fuller more time to make his case.
One of Webb’s predecessors — Andrew Scipione — was also found wanting because he wasn’t a seasoned media performer when he started the job
With the appointment of Webb occurring a year out from the state election, Perrottet picked up the phone to his then political opponent Chris Minns to explain why his Cabinet had appointed Webb. After all, if the opinion polls were correct, Webb would become Minns responsibility.
Neither anticipated the political train wreck that was to come.
As for what the Minns government needs to do from here, a Webb “makeover” of sorts is already in the works.
“She is a really good commissioner and is doing a really good job,” said one senior government source.
“She needs to improve and she knows this.”
The odd power lunch may also not go astray.
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