Laura Tingle on John Howard and the corrosion of Australia’s national debate

The level and quality of the national conversation in Australian politics and media took a turn for the worse under John Howard’s prime ministership, says ABC journalist Laura Tingle.

The reporter and author will discuss the state of public discourse at the John Button Oration, to be delivered on Saturday at Melbourne’s Capitol Theatre. Named for the late senator John Button, who served in the Hawke and Keating governments, the speech is delivered annually as part of the Melbourne Writers Festival by a prominent Australian chosen by Button’s family.

Laura Tingle, chief political correspondent of the ABC’s 7.30, will deliver the John Button Oration on Saturday, Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

“[During Howard’s leadership] we saw this shift to the weaponisation of attacks on groups of people, whether it’s Indigenous Australians, Asian immigrants, African immigrants or Muslim Australians,” Tingle says. “That was a material change – so that became part of the conversation, not just in politics but in the media as well.”

Having worked as a journalist for 40 years, the Walkley-award winner is well-placed to assess how things have evolved. She argues that while social media and the rise of divisive figures like Donald Trump have played a role, there are other major factors at play.

According to Tingle, the corrosive state of public discourse is a combination of technology, media economics and social licence. “The media and politicians give each other licence to go a bit further, to be a bit more, shall we say, frank in their assessment of people, or groups of people, or whatever,” she says.

Donald Trump’s mantras of fake news and alternative facts have given politicians around the world license to think they can say whatever they want.Credit: AP

While politicians have historically often thrown abuse at each other, called each other names and attacked individuals, Tingle argues that in the 1990s there became a more conspicuous targeting of groups of people, traced back to Howard talking about rising Asian immigration and Pauline Hanson’s incendiary comments.

As a young journalist working for The Australian newspaper, Tingle met Button when he was industry minister. She says he was charming, famous for thinking out loud, publicly debating ideas including policy and even correcting himself as he spoke.

“You just couldn’t do that now. There’s no room for nuance, there’s not even much room for politicians to explain their positions and be listened to,” she says. “I’m not saying ‘poor politicians’, but every so often politicians do something and everybody piles on and completely loses track of what the substantive issue is.”

She cites the coverage of Prime Minister Albanese at the recent rally for women’s safety as an example, reports about his behaviour on the day threatening to overshadow the very pressing core issue of concern.

Tingle also raises the massive disruption of media that took place throughout the 2000s.

“From the ’90s onwards it became clear to the newspapers that they were in financial trouble, and they had to find new audiences,” she says. “Opinion was cheaper than specialist reporting and being controversial was something that they hoped would sell newspapers.”

In the new reality, media organisations had to be perpetually updating websites, as opposed to having one deadline.

“When you’re constantly doing that and having to feed the beast, you’re constantly looking for these slight changes in position, you’re probably not able to inform yourself about all the background to the issue; you get these incremental changes in position, which come down to what one side of politics is saying about the other.”

Despite the national conversation seeming grubbier and nastier in the past decade, Tingle has hope. “I’m too much of an optimist about the world, despite everything, to say ‘we’ll all be ruined’.”

The collapse of X, formerly Twitter, is one cause for optimism: she points its power to spread misinformation during the Bondi Junction attacks as underlining one of its pitfalls.

To her mind, historically the pendulum does tend to swing back to a more measured discourse. For that to happen, the media needs to remain focused – and be more discerning: “It does require not running with the pack and considering what is the important part of this story.

“The thing that journalists and newspapers and broadcasters should always be doing is to say, we could do this story because it’s easy, but is that what our readers and viewers actually need to know? What’s the significant thing here?

“Somebody, somewhere has to calmly say, ‘hang on’ and that’s a really important job for the media now.”

The John Button Oration is at the Capitol Theatre on May 11 (sold out), part of the Melbourne Writers Festival. Tingle is also part of a panel discussion of Australian politics with Sean Kelly and David Marr on May 11 and will interview Rosie Batty on May 12 as part of MWF.

The Age is a sponsor of the Melbourne Writers Festival.

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