Antoinette Lattouf has won $70,000, but her case has cost the ABC so much more

The costs of the ABC’s decision to prematurely end the short-term contract of fill-in radio host Antoinette Lattouf are incalculable.

Forget about the $70,000 she was awarded in the judgment handed down by Justice Darryl Rangiah in the Federal Court of Australia on Wednesday morning. Even the $1 million or so it is estimated to have spent in legal costs is a spit in the ocean compared to the reputational and organisational damage this case has done.

Antoinette Lattouf addresses the media after her win in the Federal Court of Australia on Wednesday.Credit: AAPIMAGE

Since it began, managing director David Anderson, content chief Chris Oliver-Taylor and senior radio executive Stephen Ahern have all resigned from the organisation, while former chair Ita Buttrose came under intense pressure in the witness box about her interactions with senior management. Of the most senior executives involved, only radio boss Ben Latimer remains in place.

There is no suggestion those who resigned were forced to do so or that they resigned because of the Lattouf matter.

The affair has even tarnished Kim Williams, who replaced Buttrose as chair in March 2024, since he weighed in on the matter at the National Press Club, following a Fair Work Commission decision in June 2024 that Lattouf had indeed been unfairly dismissed.

“Ms Lattouf was not dismissed,” Williams insisted. “Ms Lattouf had a five-day contract, and ... the contract was brought to a close at the end of the third day.”

Only Hugh Marks, who replaced Anderson as ABC managing director in January, emerges without damage.

Marks issued a statement on Wednesday afternoon in which he conceded “the matter was not handled in line with our values and expectations. We also let down our staff and audiences, and this failure has caused understandable concern among the public and inside the organisation.”

ABC chair Kim Williams and ABC managing director Hugh Marks.Credit: Monique Westermann

At the heart of the issue was whether Lattouf was sacked at all (yes, according to the FWC and Rangiah), whether she was sacked for holding and/or expressing political views (yes, says Rangiah), and whether her race (Lebanese Christian) played a part (no, Rangiah found).

The ABC did itself no favours in attempting to argue that racism could not have been a factor in its treatment of Lattouf because she had failed to prove the very existence of a Middle-Eastern or Arab race. It later withdrew that argument after a fierce public backlash.

Complaints about Lattouf, who has been an outspoken critic of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, began flooding into the ABC immediately after she finished her first shift, though nothing she had said on air was deemed controversial.

It soon became clear, Rangiah wrote, “that the complaints were an orchestrated campaign by pro-Israel lobbyists”. But Buttrose insisted on sharing them with Anderson and Oliver-Taylor nonetheless.

Three days into her five-day hosting stint, management became aware of a post shared on Instagram by Lattouf they believed constituted a breach of the ABC’s social media policy.

Rangiah found in his 177-page judgment that following this discovery, “the consternation of senior managers of the ABC turned into what can be described as a state of panic”.

Within the hour, Rangiah said, “a decision was made that Ms Lattouf would be taken off air. The policies she was alleged to have breached were not identified, nor was she given any opportunity to defend herself against the allegations.”

The judge found pressure from pro-Israeli activists and an imminent story in The Australian stoked that sense of panic.

He also found Anderson had misconstrued a “sarcastic” social media post as expressing support for a Hamas campaign of “ethnic cleansing” (it did not).

“While Mr Anderson was mistaken in his interpretation of the post, it does demonstrate that he attributed to Ms Lattouf hateful anti-Semitic opinions,” Rangiah wrote.

The decision to terminate Lattouf’s engagement at the ABC was made by Oliver-Taylor alone, though in response to concerns shared at the top of the organisation.

“I find that Mr Oliver-Taylor’s reasons for his decision included his desire to mitigate further complaints about the ABC employing someone attributed with holding a political opinion opposing the Israeli military campaign in Gaza,” said Rangiah.

Holding or expressing a political opinion is not, Rangiah found, a valid reason for terminating someone’s employment, even at the national broadcaster.

Rangiah found “protection for employees … against termination of employment for reasons including ‘political opinion’ encompasses not only the holding of a political opinion but also the expression of a political opinion”.

The ramifications of all this for the ABC and other media organisations are potentially profound.

In his statement to staff following Wednesday’s ruling, Marks stressed “the fundamental obligations the ABC and its employees have to be independent and impartial in our work to ensure we continue to earn the trust of all Australians. Those obligations don’t change as a result of this decision.”

But he also acknowledged that there was confusion about the organisation’s guidelines around use of social media and promised “we will talk more about this in coming weeks”.

It has arguably never been more important that Australians should be able to trust in the national broadcaster to report fairly and accurately without caving to external pressure.

Balancing that with the right of individual journalists to hold and express political opinions won’t be easy. But that is the task the ABC must tackle if it is to move forward from one of the ugliest episodes in its long history.