By Stephen Brook and Kishor Napier-Raman
Can’t stop, won’t stop. That’s ABC chairman Kim Williams, who rolled into the sun and celebrity-drenched northern NSW hamlet of Byron Bay for the latest edition of the Kim Williams Show on the weekend at the Byron Writers Festival. Williams was joined on stage by another big beast of the media landscape, former ABC presenter Kerry O’Brien.
“I need to be careful because words get used,” said Williams, before discovering that when O’Brien is in search of a news hook, no one can avoid a KO’B KO.
ABC chairman Kim Williams.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
The former host of The 7.30 Report and Lateline took his time, politely asking Williams fascinating questions about his memoir Rules of Engagement before jumping to ABC output, particularly news and current affairs.
“I think we have, on the one hand, a tendency to have too much in news and current affairs that is filler and bland,” said Williams, who took over as chair from Ita Buttrose in March, which now feels like a century ago.
“I think we tend at times to go to that which is more representative of tabloid sensibility than what I would regard as being national responsibility.”
This drew immediate applause from the lit fest crowd, and no doubt gasps from ABC staff group chats.
Former broadcaster Kerry O’Brien.Credit: ABC
Williams was careful to set out his stall and call for more ABC funding, sorry, investment.
“The ABC that I have inherited is one that is severely depleted and has been over time,” he said, pointing to a 13.7 per cent funding reduction during the period of Coalition government.
O’Brien interviewed Williams in Byron Bay.Credit: Jozsef Benke
Funding cuts had made the organisation “somewhat more timid”, “very much less confident” and “unfortunately in my view very much more interior focused”, Williams said.
He said a prominent but unnamed politician had given him his views about ABC news and current affairs “in fairly Anglo Celtic terms”.
However, Williams said ABC viewers were not dumping the 7pm news for SBS.
He said local radio was “in a rebuild phase” after a decade of neglect and must provide “the pulse of the city”.
Both men threw praise bombs. O’Brien said Williams was the most open and engaging ABC chairman since he first worked at the corporation in 1972.
Williams praised O’Brien’s output “without wanting to be guilty of inappropriate flattery”.
And Williams did have praise for some journalistic output, including “an exemplary piece of really great investment in journalism”, which turned out to be the exposé of the CFMEU prosecuted by this masthead, The Australian Financial Review and 60 Minutes.
DISAPPEARING ACT
Scott Morrison not only won the supposedly unwinnable election in 2019, but the former prime minister can also make awkward quotes disappear from national newspapers.
In June, The Australian Financial Review detailed how former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull “at his own initiative” offered his services to the incoming government of Anthony Albanese. Namely, that he, Turnbull, would have a word with French President Emmanuel Macron to reinstate the French submarine-building contract Morrison had spectacularly binned in favour of the AUKUS agreement.
History will record that nothing came of this suggestion. But how generous and public spirited of Turnbull to offer it.
Former prime minister Scott Morrison and French President Emmanuel Macron.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen
The original print version of the yarn, by AFR international editor James Curran, who doubles as a professor of modern history at the University of Sydney, included this spicy quote from Morrison, about his defiance in cancelling the French subs contract.
“I mean, heaven forbid we upset the French! … the great disadvantage of upsetting the French is what, exactly? And the great restoration in that relationship has delivered what, exactly?”
But this plain talking has dematerialised from the online version.
Two sources told us that Morrison had complained that the above quote was off the record and that it was then removed. But despite our best efforts at sleuthing, we can’t confirm. Let’s file it under one of life’s little mysteries.
FRIENDS IN NEED
Federal parliament is back after a five-week winter break, and with it lobbyists, business chancers and sundry hangers-on will recommence their orbit around Parliament House.
And with a decidedly back-to-school vibe the Parliamentary Friends of Ending Loneliness is throwing a breakfast shindig on Monday at 7am.
Far be it for us to point out that old aphorism, “If you want a friend in politics, get a dog.”
And did you know that one in four Australians are now persistently lonely, driven by unemployment, cost-of-living strains and cultural and linguistic barriers? Well, you do now.
Discussing solutions will be Michelle Lim, chief executive of the group Ending Loneliness, alongside the obligatory celebrity invitee, in this case, the “original Yellow Wiggle” Greg Page.
Assistant Minister for Health and Aged Care Ged Kearney is also set to address the breakfast, hosted by the co-chairs of the Parliamentary Friends Group Bridget Archer and Andrew Giles.
If any MPs know a thing or two about ending loneliness, it would be the Liberal Party rebel and the minister demoted to skills and training after the government’s disastrous handling of immigration.
BUTLER IS BACK
One former MP who has no such need for the making of parliamentary friends is Terri Butler. Butler was the rising star Labor MP for the Brisbane seat of Griffith from 2014 until her shock loss to Greens candidate Max Chandler-Mather in 2022.
Former Labor MP Terri Butler has been appointed to the Fair Work Commission.Credit: Dan Peled
On Friday came news that Workplace Relations Minister Murray Watt had appointed Butler, 46, deputy president of the Fair Work Commission.
The minister’s press release said the appointment was about “restoring balance”, implying but not stating such after years of Coalition “jobs for the boys” appointments.
One fact missing from Butler’s extensive industrial relations CV detailed in the release was her and Watt’s affiliation with the Australian Labor Party. The job at the FWC is hers until she has to retire aged 65.
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