Norman Swan meets his match with Nick Coatsworth to join Nine Entertainment as its health guru

Rival doctors ... Norman Swan (left) and Nick Coatsworth. Pictures: File

“Australia’s most trusted doctor” was the overblown moniker bestowed by Norman Swan upon himself, even though he hasn’t seen a patient since the 80s. In fact, Swan maintains a practising certificate through his profession as a journalist, and it’s only through this work that he was awarded some chest candy on Australia Day – an Order of Australia medal – acknowledging his “significant service to the broadcast media as a science and health commentator”.

Notwithstanding some serious on-air gaffes, Swan’s bed-wetting on lockdowns and repeated calls to tighten restrictions during the pandemic have all led to the accrual of a great many foes. Among them is Nick Coatsworth, the frustratingly dashing former deputy chief medical officer who’s been rather public with his contempt for Swan’s analyses.

This includes sneering at Swan’s “most trusted doctor” claim – used as the subtitle to a book he released last year – and regular towellings in the press (most recently when Swan mistakenly connected the deaths of Labor senator Kimberley Kitching and cricketer Shane Warne with the side-effects of Covid-19, a misstep that led to effusive apologies).

But Coatsworth’s sniping mostly took place in an armchair capacity, on the platform formerly known as Twitter, and not as a paid-up representative of any news organisation.

Margin Call hears that’s about to change, with Coatsworth having been picked up for full-time work with Nine Entertainment as its resident health guru – basically a rival to run up against Swan and perhaps Seven’s Ginni Mansberg.

Coatsworth wouldn’t comment when contacted, but the role is an advisory position with a greater number of on-air appearances than the casual stints he’s been showing up for on the Today Show. Presumably there’ll be a few dispatches in the print offerings, too, but the ink’s still drying on all that detail. No comment from Nine, either way, and no doubt a very plum hire. Of course, Margin Call is eager to see how some of Coatsworth’s more socially conservative views – yet to be properly ventilated on the public record – go down with the pinko readers of The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.

But, hey, nothing wrong with a plurality of views!

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Woke or broke

Always an exciting prospect to apply for a clerkship at a tier 1 legal firm, even if it would seem the applications are starting to needle the kids for the sort of personal information that once only mattered to Liberal preselectors.

Budding clerks at Herbert Smith Freehills are being asked to identify whether or not they’re trans, of course, and also their religion and cultural background, which is already veering into the weeds.

But Margin Call was truly puzzled to learn that applicants are also being asked about their sexual orientation – gay, straight, bisexual, etc. The form itself says these questions are all in the service of creating an “anti-racist organisation”, a means of stripping out the “deep-seated inequities from which no society or business is exempt”. Did Robin DiAngelo write this? It’s woke tosh of the highest order.

A spokesman said: “We ask this information to help us report on recruitment trends in relation to the candidates we are attracting, and to monitor whether we need to take any particular measures to encourage applications from minority groups so that our candidate base is more reflective of the underlying population. The responses are not used for selection purposes.”

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Scaling up

Scale Facilitation founder David Collard. Picture: Abby Holden

Almost anyone noteworthy linked to David Collard’s increasingly dubious Scale Facilitation outfit has flown the coop since that Australian Federal Police raid on the company’s Geelong headquarters in June.

And that’s to say nothing of the unpaid staff and affiliates and contractors who have started approaching the Fair Work Commission for advice on taking recourse. We hear that others are moving to start civil action against the company.

Reports over the weekend suggest that Scale is now also in default of its agreement to buy British-based battery maker Britishvolt, with BV’s administrators confirming that final payments to purchase the company haven’t been made. Scale, of course, moved swiftly to dispute that account.

“The timing of the final instalment to the administrator is linked to a funding facility which when closed will also cover the cost of the land acquisition and provide additional working capital for the project,” the company said.

It’s the same tired excuse that’s been used by Scale for months to string along hapless employees, some of whom have remortgaged their homes and are living off charity. The money, Collard says, is always just over the other side of that hill. Just another handshake away and the liquidity will gush forth in working capital. No one’s buying it.

David Collard with Richard Marles. Picture: Supplied

Collard’s other finely-honed skill has been surrounding himself with political and corporate players, including the likes of Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles, whose chummy association and hyping-up of this shonk makes a mockery of his office and remains totally unexplained. Then there’s AustralianSuper director Claire Keating, a member of Scale’s advisory board (if it still exists?). Perhaps it was through her affiliation with Scale that Collard managed to cajole seven AustralianSuper board members to dine with him in New York during March, later boasting to his colleagues that the AusSuper troupe were almost on the hook to start investing.

Present at the gathering was AustralianSuper CEO Paul Schroder who, according to text messages from Collard leaked to Margin Call, “gave a speech at the end thanking us and in particular thanking the team for being so welcoming on (sic) New York”.

There were also “follow up texts or emails” from three board members, including the chair of AustralianSuper’s investment committee, Mark Delaney, who asked Collard “for an email with a one pager … so they can assess and get to the right team”.

This, according to Collard, was indicative of “clear speed and preference to coinvest” and that AustralianSuper was “visibly motivated” during the discussions about Britishvolt, a deal which, per the weekend reporting, appears to be circling the drain.

No response from AusSuper, of course, or from Keating. Maybe the less said the better?