ABC host Fran Kelly dishes out advice to journalists: ‘Less commentary, more reporting’
The veteran broadcaster has dished out pro bono tips to journalists when covering issues such as the Indigenous voice to parliament, climate science, the Middle East and Covid-19.
Veteran ABC journalist Fran Kelly strode to the stage at a posh hotel in Sydney on Friday night to deliver the annual Andrew Olle Media Lecture, and almost immediately issued some helpful advice for her industry colleagues.
We’re paraphrasing, but here’s the gist of it:
Don’t ever make the story about you.
Telling isn’t the same as reporting.
And serve up facts. Verified facts.
Sage tips, from top to bottom. Kelly didn’t name any names, of course.
But it didn’t go unnoticed that her speech – which focused on the importance of truth in reporting, and the dangerous creep of disinformation and misinformation – was delivered less than a month after ABC managing director David Anderson commissioned an independent review into issues relating to the broadcaster’s coverage of a Special Forces operation in Afghanistan in 2012.
Days before Anderson announced the review, ABC news director Justin Stevens had conceded that a video of Australian troops firing weapons from a helicopter – which was aired on the 7.30 program in 2022 – had been “incorrectly edited” and subsequently removed from all of the media organisation’s online platforms.
The audio attached to the ABC video showed six shots were fired from the helicopter, but raw footage of the incident from inside the aircraft obtained by Seven’s Spotlight program last month clearly shows that just one shot was fired – a fact that completely changed the tenor of the ABC’s story.
Kelly didn’t reference the story but Diary is told the unspoken, in-house case study of misinformation hung heavy in the air.
In her speech, Kelly addressed the challenges she and her ABC colleagues faced when covering the voice to parliament referendum last year.
“It is one year since the referendum that proved to be a case study of the widening fissures in our society and the distorting impact misinformation and disinformation can have on our democratic processes,” she said.
“It’s also a case study of how ill-equipped our media and our institutions are to deal with it, taking sides early and backing into corners from which there is no emerging.
“A hard line, taken early and argued forcefully has much more impact than a nuanced open-minded, consider-all-sides campaign.
“Indigenous Australians are still reeling from that tactic.
“So this is the task for the mainstream media. We need to come out of any defensive crouch and get back to our crucial role of providing the national audience with the information it needs to make an informed view at times of contentious, divisive national debate.
“On the voice, on climate science, on the Middle East, on Covid. Whatever it is. Less commentary, more reporting. Less telling, more inquiry.”
The subject matter of Kelly’s speech, which was underpinned by a theme of “we must do better”, was not entirely dissimilar to the lecture given by Leigh Sales at the same event last year.
“Too often, too many journalists at all media organisations are abandoning values espoused by people like Andrew Olle, for various reasons,” Sales said.
“One is that some reporters prefer to be activists and crusaders rather than fact-finders or straight reporters. They enjoy their heroic status among the tribes of social media or their subscribers. I’m not sure they can even identify their own bias.
“The job is not telling the audience what to think; it’s giving them the fullest set of facts possible so they can make up their own minds what to think.”
Nine circus rolls on
The fast-becoming-infamous Intersection report into Nine’s workplace culture has achieved the unthinkable – somehow, the initiative that was designed to give aggrieved staff some agency has managed to do the opposite.
Several female staff were horrified to see the Intersection report publish a bank of supposedly anonymous quotes in its glossy 80-page document. Many of the “pullout” quotes were so specific in nature that complainants felt they could be easily identified – both by colleagues and by the alleged offenders – thus compromising the confidentiality of their participation in the process.
“It’s horrendous,” one female journalist told Diary.
The release of the report on Thursday also sparked some infighting within Nine, with some members of the television and current affairs unit upset because they believed their colleagues at Nine’s publishing division, which houses The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald and The Australian Financial Review, were given earlier access to the findings of the investigation.
Diary spoke to a senior figure at Nine on Sunday who described the company’s handling of the entire process as a “farce” and a “circus”.
Intersection, the consulting firm that conducted the review, could not be contacted for comment on Sunday.
Albo dials in
All journos know the feeling – that moment when your phone rings, and the name of the person you’ve just exposed in a scoop pops up on the screen.
Should I take the call or let it go to voicemail?
Sydney’s 2GB breakfast radio host Ben Fordham faced that familiar dilemma last Tuesday when he broke the news that Anthony Albanese and the Prime minister’s fiancee, Jodie Haydon, had just snapped up a luxury home with glorious ocean views.
Just after the 7am news, Fordham told his listeners: “The Prime Minister has bought a new home to share with his future wife Jodie.
“It’s absolutely spectacular, it’s not in Sydney and it wasn’t cheap.”
Fordham revealed the PM’s future abode – a “stunning clifftop home on the Central Coast of NSW” – cost $4.3m.
Anthony Albanese’s own party is turning on him.
— Ben Fordham Live (@BenFordhamLive) October 16, 2024
They’ve blasted him for purchasing a $4.3M house.
A Labor MP has described the move as “f***ing terrible.â€
Listen to their full comments HERE.
🎧https://t.co/VeEFC1k6lX🎧
The news quickly went viral but within hours of the radio host dropping the bombshell news, Fordham received a call from the man himself, the PM, about his Copacabana purchase.
Fordham said his stomach churned when Albo’s name appeared on his phone, and readied himself to cop a spray.
“I let the call have three rings before I picked it up,” Fordham told Diary.
“To my surprise he actually rang to thank me for giving him the heads-up on the story.”
Fordham had contacted the PM hours earlier to let him know the story was coming, knowing full well Albo’s property purchase was going to cause one almighty stir.
Fordham said on air: “When I contacted him to let him know we had the details, Anthony Albanese told me and I quote, ‘I’m about to get married to Jodie and start a new chapter of our lives. Jodie’s a coastie and spending time with her up there is awesome. It will be nice to be closer to her parents and her family one day.’ ”
Amid widespread criticism that the Prime Minister’s purchase was a tin-eared move during a cost-of-living crisis, Fordham returned to the airwaves the next day to say he’d spoken to a slew of Labor MPs who privately told him they were furious.
One unnamed MP even told the 2GB host: “My instinct is this is effing terrible.”
Horseshoe effect
Far-left commentator and axed Nine newspaper columnist Clementine Ford took to social media platform Instagram last week to share a bizarre 41-second commentary on the death of the leader of terrorist organisation Hamas, Yahya Sinwar.
Australia’s best known astrologer-feminist Clementine Ford reports from the front seat of her car that the death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was connected to last nights Aries full moon - which was reportedly “massiveâ€. pic.twitter.com/xu0jMilLwM
— Andrew Glover (@theandrewglover) October 18, 2024
Filming a monologue while sitting in the front seat of a car, Ford weirdly linked the Hamas leader’s death to a full moon.
“It was a massive full moon in Aries, I’m not an astrologer, I just follow a lot of astrology pages, I’m a tarot reader though and basically like a big howl collectively went through the world last night, astrologically speaking,” Ford said in her piece to phone camera.
“Then to wake up this morning and to see the news and to see the way that the corrupt Western empire is framing the targeting of Sinwar – yeah, interesting.”
Or as US President Joe Biden said more succinctly: “It’s a good day for the world.”
But it was another post shared by Ford that caught the eye of many after she re-shared controversial comments by artist Saul Williams that read: “I’d be careful about banking on the martyrdom of Palestinian resistance.
“When authorities killed that dude from Nazareth they believed they had crushed his whole movement – now we count time from the year of his birth.”
Activist Drew Pavlou posted that it was “one of the sickest things yet from the Australian pro-Palestine camp: mentally ill feminist writer Clementine Ford compares Yahya Sinwar to Jesus.”
One of the sickest things yet from the Australian pro-Palestine camp: mentally ill feminist writer Clementine Ford compares Yahya Sinwar to Jesus pic.twitter.com/gpcnWsyJoA
— Drew Pavlou 🇦🇺🇺🇸🇺🇦 (@DrewPavlou) October 19, 2024
Ford’s social media foray was also the hot topic of discussion on ABC’s Insiders on Sunday morning when The Age and Sydney Morning Herald’s political reporter Paul Sakkal told the panel: “This morning I noticed Andrew Tate, Jackson Hinkle, really influential malignant forces in the manosphere with millions of followers (on the right) and Clementine Ford on the left on her Instagram … posted a repost of someone who could compared Sinwar to Jesus Christ.
“The amount of young Australians who would be seeing this far left and very far right (commentary), this horseshoe effect of glorifying Sinwar, I think … is very troubling.”
Insiders’ host David Speers agreed. “Yeah, it is,” the ABC host said.
Musical chairs at Seven
It wasn’t that long ago that former Channel 7 Brisbane news director Michael Coombes ended the career of broadcasting veteran Sharyn Ghidella by telling her she was sacked – while she was halfway through getting a cut and colour at the hairdressers.
The 57-year-old has been replaced by the much younger newsreader Sarah Greenhalgh, aged 34, who told Brisbane’s Sunday Mail on the weekend: “Seven has effectively promoted me, knowing that I am pregnant as well.”
Greenhalgh was appointed to the prominent role by Seven’s news and current affairs boss Anthony De Ceglie, and of course it’s a good thing that pregnant women are not overlooked for key positions in the brutal business of TV. Interestingly, it was the very same network that hired Ghidella 17 years ago, when she was also pregnant.
While Ghidella was working at Channel 9 in Sydney she was poached by Seven to head north and take up a weekend newsreading position in the Sunshine State at the time she was just months away from giving birth to her first son, Austin.
Ghidella has since been snapped up by Channel 10 to read the weeknightly news since she was abruptly sacked by Seven, and all eyes are now on who will replace Greenhalgh, who is six months pregnant, when she heads off on maternity leave.
The frontrunners, Diary has been told, are Seven’s 4pm newsreader Katrina Blowers and weekend Channel 7 news presenter Samantha Heathwood.
Whoever does snare the role will be presenting the news alongside Seven’s Max Futcher, who told The Sunday Mail that he’s still in close contact with Ghidella despite her brutal axing from the network.
“We still speak all the time, but the best thing has been to see her land on her feet like we all knew that she would, and to see her prospering as well,” he said.
Walkley shakedown
Finalists at this year’s Walkley Awards, which will be held in Sydney on November 19, will be required to wear black tie, with unusually deep pockets.
Earlier this month, just days after being told of their prestigious nomination as a finalist in the annual awards, the cream of the profession’s crop learned that for the first time in Walkleys history, they would have to cough up $250 just to attend the gala dinner!
And for those finalists not in the media union, the cost is $275! That’ll learn ya!
For an event that positions itself as the solar system’s premier journalism awards event, the pay-your-own-way edict is an embarrassment.
Does Meryl Streep have to tap her card on the way into the Academy Awards? Doubt it.
In all likelihood, the journalists’ employers will be forced to cover the cost, because they won’t want a situation where their finalists aren’t at the event to collect the trophies, should they win.
But that can add up to a big outlay for media organisations such as the ABC and Guardian Australia, both of which regularly, and publicly, bemoan the fact that they’re short of cash.
For example, the Guardian has 12 finalists in this year’s awards across various categories, so that’s $3000-plus just to get them in the door!
And there’s always the chance you’ll go home empty-handed!
So why is the Walkley Foundation squeezing the finalists for money?
Simple answer: it’s not exactly flush at the moment.
Earlier this year, the Walkleys changed its donation policy, deciding henceforth that it would no longer accept sponsorship dollars from companies whose dealings “offer no tangible benefit to humanity”.
That, of course, is a subjective benchmark, and might explain why lucrative sponsors haven’t exactly been kicking down the door since principal commercial partner Ampol (aka The Baddies) parted company with the Walkleys in May.
The Walkleys Foundation would not disclose the value of Ampol’s annual contribution to the awards body, but a conservative estimate by one of Diary’s well-placed sources put it at more than $500,000.
In a statement to Diary, Walkley Foundation chief executive Shona Martyn said: “Like all Australian businesses, the Walkley Foundation is reviewing its costs in the wake of the tougher economic climate.
“As part of this review, the foundation’s management and board of directors have resolved to bring the Walkley Awards gala dinner in line with other media awards and charge finalists attending so as to cover the costs of their three-course dinners and drinks.
“This is a prudent business decision.
“The departure of Ampol as a sponsor has not left a shortfall in awards revenue as new sponsors have come on board to more than replace that revenue, including McGrathNicol, the Master Builders Association and Ogilvy.”
Full disclosure: Diary has never been nominated for a Walkley Award, and after the publication of this item, we’re confident that our streak will continue for many years to come.
Nick Tabakoff is on leave.
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