‘Racist country’: ABC’s Laura Tingle expresses regret over outburst
A high-profile ABC journalist has been “counselled” by her news boss after claiming Australia is a “racist country” during a panel discussion.
The national broadcaster has moved to diffuse a political blow up over high profile broadcaster Laura Tingle’s claim that Australia is a “racist country”.
The journalist issued a lengthy statement on Wednesday night revealing her “regret” that the comments had resulted in a “pile on.”
ABC Director, News Justin Stevens said her remarks at the Sydney Writers’ Festival lacked the context, balance and supporting information of her work for the ABC and would not have met the ABC’s editorial standards.
“Although the remarks were conversational, and not made in her work capacity, the ABC and its employees have unique obligations in the Australian media,’’ he said.
“Today she has explained her remarks in more detail to ensure there is a factual record of the relevant context and detail.
“The ABC’s editorial standards serve a vital role. Laura has been reminded of their application at external events as well as in her work and I have counselled her over the remarks.
“Laura Tingle is one of Australia’s most experienced, knowledgeable and accomplished journalists. During her career, including working for The Australian, the AFR and the ABC, she has always sought to better inform Australians by cutting through the politics that often alienates them. The ABC strongly believes hearing informed and independent voices is valuable to our society.”
The ABC political journalist released a lengthy statement clarifying the remarks as Nationals leader David Littleproud suggested that it was time for “more news and less views” at the ABC.
“Her [Laura Tingle] statements over the last week or two are a direct affront on an alternative point of view that goes against the very heart of what the ABC should be,” Mr Littleproud told Sky News Australia.
“It should be more news and less news at the ABC.
“This is a test for ABC leadership.”
In response, the former political editor for The Australian Financial Review released a lengthy statement.
“I did indeed make the observation on Sunday that we are a racist country, in the context of a discussion about the political prospects ahead,’’ Tingle said.
“I wasn’t saying every Australian is a racist. But we clearly have an issue with racism. For some months now, for example, The Australian newspaper has been devoting considerable space to its alarm about a rise in anti-Semitism in Australia.
“Without even going into the historic record, there is also ample evidence that racism remains a particular problem in our legal and policing systems. A coronial inquest underway in the Northern Territory has become mired in an expose of racism in the NT’s elite policing unit. Racism and racial profiling repeatedly show up as an issue of concern in our policing and justice systems.”
Tingle then mused that the morning radio news bulletins on the ABC on Monday featured “several stories that were related to racism”, she said, including one about racial profiling of young South Sudanese men in a police presentation to legal practitioners in Melbourne.
“Surveys, including by the ABC, have repeatedly found the majority of Australians of non-European backgrounds reporting experiences of discrimination and racism in their lives, sometimes starting as early as primary school,’’ she said.
“Is it relevant to raise this record of Australian racism in political analysis? Absolutely, if it becomes an issue of controversy in our political contest – as it clearly did when Pauline Hanson appeared on the national stage in 1996 and declared the country was being “swamped with Asians”. John Howard had similarly flirted with the issue of Asian immigration in the 1980s and Julia Gillard did too in 2013 when she used a speech on a visit to western Sydney to announce a clampdown on the issue of temporary skilled worker visas.
“In my commentary at the ABC, and at the Sydney Writers’ Festival, I expressed my concern at the risks involved in Peter Dutton pressing the hot button of housing and linking it to migration for these reasons.
“Political leaders, by their comments, give licence to others to express opinions they may not otherwise express.
“That does not make them racist.
But it has real world implications for many Australians.”
She then added a statement of “regret”.
“I regret that when I was making these observations at the Writers’ Festival the nature of the free-flowing panel discussion means they were not surrounded by every quote substantiating them which would have – and had – been included in what I had said earlier on the ABC,’’ she said.
“This has created the opportunity for yet another anti-ABC pile-on.
“This is not helpful to me or to the ABC. Or to the national debate
“I am proud of my work as a journalist at the ABC, on all its platforms, and I let that work speak for itself.”
News boss Justin Stevens confirmed on Thursday that Laura Tingle had been “counselled over her remarks”, at the Sydney Writers Festival on Sunday.
“Laura has been reminded of their application at external events as well as in her work and I have counselled her over the remarks,” he said.
Mr Anderson will be questioned about Tingle’s comments at a Senate Estimates hearing in Canberra on Thursday.
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