ABC chair Ita Buttrose demands answers on arts

ABC chair Ita Buttrose personally ordered a review into the public broadcaster’s arts coverage.

ABC managing director David Anderson appears ar Senate estimates. Picture: Sean Davey

ABC chair Ita Buttrose personally ordered a review into the public broadcaster’s arts coverage, amid deepening concern over the weakening of the sector’s prominence across the organisation’s various platforms.

It’s understood Ms Buttrose’s extraordinary intervention in demanding the review followed the unveiling in June of the ABC’s long-awaited five-year strategic plan, which included up to 250 staff being laid off — with as many as 50 from the “entertainment and specialist” unit — in a bid to plug an $84m budget hole.

ABC managing director David Anderson revealed at Senate estimates last week that “the (arts) review was requested by the board, specifically the chair”, and was subsequently undertaken by an executive within his management team. The findings of the review were delivered to the board earlier this month and are likely to be factored into the organisation’s program plans for next year, which are set to be unveiled next month.

ABC chair Ita Buttrose. Picture: Kym Smith

A spokesman for the ABC said: “We do not comment on ABC board matters.”

But the diminished arts coverage by the ABC has become a festering sore within the national broadcaster, with many in the arts sector despondent about the lowered profile of the subject.

During last week’s estimates hearing, Mr Anderson was also asked about the 2017 review of ABC Arts by former board member and investment banker Simon Mordant. Mr Anderson said some of that report’s recommendations were acted upon, but that “some happened sooner than others”.

Mr Mordant recently attacked the television and radio broadcaster’s “poor’’ approach to cultural programming, claiming such programs were invisible across its platforms.

“I have been very disappointed that since I left the board a few years ago, the focus on arts and culture has not been visible to me,” Mr Mordant told The Weekend Australian in August.

“My sense from the outside is that the ABC continues to do a poor job promoting its arts coverage across platforms.’’

New arts programming on the broadcaster’s primary television channel plummeted from 114 hours in 2008-09 to just 15 hours a decade later, in 2018-19. The most recent annual report for 2019/20 does not measure the amount of time dedicated to specialist content, such as arts coverage, and the ABC did not respond to questions about the latest numbers.

Former ABC board member Michael Lynch recently said he was “appalled” and “pretty bloody distressed” by the steep fall in arts programming on ABC TV. He accused the corporation of breaching its charter and “walking away’’ from the arts as the sector struggled during the coronavirus crisis.

But the ABC has argued the growth of its streaming service makes it “mis­leading’’ to judge its arts output by what is broadcast on the main television channel.

The disquiet over the ABC’s arts coverage comes as director of news Gaven Morris defended himself against claims that he had told staff they should “spend less time on the concerns of the inner city elites and more time on the things that matter to central Queensland”.

On Sunday, Morris tweeted that his remarks had been misquoted, and that he was saying “ABC News can work even harder to reflect the lives, concerns and diversity of suburban and regional Australia”.