Sharp Shooting: Channel Seven stargazer’s new course, the absence of one Nine veteran
The absence of one television veteran is fuelling talk the reporter is poised to announce her retirement.
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Where’s Liz?
The absence of television veteran Liz Hayes from Nine’s latest 60 Minutes’ promo is fuelling talk the reporter is poised to announce her retirement after more than four decades in the business.
The Nine stalwart, who this year will celebrate her 44th year at the media company, is mysteriously missing from the latest promo spruiking the 60 Minutes’ 2025 line-up which has been running in Nine’s tennis coverage this month.
Featured in the 60 Minutes’ line-up are reporters Tara Brown, Amelia Adams and 2024 newcomers Adam Hegarty and Dimity Clancey but not Hayes, who has been a part of the 60 Minutes furniture since 1996 and on the Nine roster as one of its biggest stars since 1981.
Nine reps were silent on the subject of Hayes’ possible impending retirement when this writer made inquiries about Hayes’ contract in October and stonewalled our attempts to confirm last year’s axing of the Hayes-fronted cold case program Under Investigation.
It also declined to discuss her non-appearance at the network’s Upfronts promotions event in October.
Instead the broadcaster pointed us in the direction of Nine’s November US Presidential Election coverage which Hayes co-presented as evidence of her enduring value to Nine.
Hayes, who is on an estimated $500k-$600k-a-year contract, was criticised by some for her US Election contribution and pilloried by rival Ten for fumbling a live cross with Amelia Adams in which a weary-looking Hayes searched her notes in vain before ruminating that post-election sentiment in the US was “anything”.
Hayes, who turns 69 this year, has long been a favourite of TV bosses and something of a protected species at Nine which has laboured diligently through the decades to quarantine its star and former Today anchor from the unusual media and public attention attached to one who has had a series of failed marriages and high profile relationships including one with larrikin ad boss John Singleton.
Nine had not responded to our request for comment by press time.
Seven’s stargazer charts new course
Sharpshooting didn’t need a crystal ball or accreditation with the Australian Academy of Astrology to foresee the failure of the thoroughly bemusing partnership between Seven’s prime time news bulletin and astrologer Natasha “Astrotash” Weber.
Six months after Seven’s rookie news director Anthony De Ceglie introduced astrology to the network’s serious news offering Astrotash’s spot has been pulled due, this column hears, to its failure to draw new audiences to Seven’s 6pm news hour.
Not to fear.
When one idea withers in De Ceglie’s unbridled imagination another is bound to take root.
Next off the rank is said to be a regular “The Bright Side” spot – an evening news story dedicated to a little-known community do-gooder.
This column loves a good news story as much as the next news junkie yet such a spot is surely going to grate with Seven’s increasingly sensational evening doom-scroll laden with acquired CCTV footage of hapless accidents and brutal assaults.
A “The Bright Side” segment was previously introduced to Seven’s Melbourne news bulletin and has been dubbed a success in that city.
We hear the introduction of the spot in Sydney will likely force Seven’s back-end sports report to be trimmed by about 60-90-seconds from a slender five minutes a night to a lean 3.5 minutes which will equate to less prime time airtime for sports anchor Mel McLaughlin.
A rush for the door before Marks starts at ABC
The departure of ABC chief content officer Chris Oliver-Taylor comes as chairman Kim Williams ploughs on with his determined plans to restore ABC radio to the position it occupied in the hearts and minds of Australians in the decades before most of its target audience was born.
On Thursday, after less than two years in the role, Oliver-Taylor, the executive who played a role in controversially sacking fill-in broadcaster Antoinette Lattouf in 2023, announced he was quitting the ABC.
He joins outgoing managing director David Anderson, the executive who appointed Oliver-Taylor to oversee the ABC’s newly created content division in 2023.
Under Oliver-Taylor, the ABC content division drew together the ABC’s entertainment and specialist sector along with its regional and local sector and saw Oliver-Taylor manage three content platforms, screen, audio and digital.
That structure and strategy was struck a fatal blow last year however when Williams was appointed chairman and announced plans to break ABC Radio out of the content silo and into a stand-alone audio division.
Anderson and Oliver-Taylor are expected to exit the national broadcaster prior to the arrival of new managing director Hugh Marks who takes up his role on March 10.
Answering to Marks as the director of audio is Ben Latimer, a man whose name and reputation precedes him and who joined the ABC in 2023 from Nova.
In announcing his departure on Thursday, Oliver-Taylor was reflective.
“Over the past year, the role and responsibilities have considerably shifted, with audio now reporting directly to the MD and some digital content moved elsewhere. These changes, along with a redefined creative vision set by the board, have prompted me to reflect on the ABC’s future needs,” he said.
He added that he had been in consultation with MD Anderson and chair Williams “across many months”.
The British-born Oliver-Taylor is an experienced media executive who previously worked for Netflix, was CEO of Fremantle Media, an AFTRS board director and, previously, was the ABC’s head of television business operations.
His departure follows news this month of highly regarded ABC deputy chairman Peter Tonagh’s departure from the ABC board.
Tonagh resigned days after Marks was announced as the ABC’s new managing director, his resignation raising eyebrows.
Tonagh last week joined Nine Entertainment’s board.
Seven’s news boss under fire over Belling hire
Again with Seven’s De Ceglie and it’s been claimed the Seven’s news boss was surprised to learn his new midday news bulletin might ratchet up an unexpected cost.
Last year this column revealed Seven’s plans to move entertainment reporter Edwina Bartholomew from the Sunrise program to a daytime news reading role.
The role that was to have enticed Bartholomew away from Sunrise (something that has been in the wind for sometime we hear) and landed her in the chair as presenter of a new midday news bulletin, however she rejected the approach.
This week Seven unveiled the new one-hour bulletin, to be called Seven’s National News at Noon and starting on Monday.
It replaces the broadcaster’s long-running 11.30am national bulletin.
After Bartholomew rejected the gig, a substitute reader was sought.
De Ceglie might have expected to claw back a few bob by tapping one of Seven’s other regular newsreaders – of the ilk of Angie Asimus or Amber Laidlaw – however what he may not have considered was his news staffers disinterest in presenting a sponsored news bulletin featuring paid advertorials.
This would explain why, after laying off dozens of experienced news staff including newsreader Sharyn Ghidella in 2024, De Ceglie had to find the coin to hire former Ten newsreader Natarsha Belling, on a rumoured six figure contract.
Talk about own goal.
De Ceglie seems to see it differently of course and this week was jubilantly spruiking the bulletin as a “game changer”.
Belling will juggle the role with her new gig and weekday appearances on Triple M’s revamped Sydney breakfast radio show alongside ex NRL player Beau Ryan and ex West Tigers captain Aaron Woods.
Originally published as Sharp Shooting: Channel Seven stargazer’s new course, the absence of one Nine veteran
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