‘Big names’, including Tingle and Karvelas, able to defy ABC

ABC chief David Anderson has conceded high-profile journalists including Laura Tingle, Patricia Karvelas and Paul Barry have never been taken off-air, despite making public comments that could be construed as ‘contentious’ or lacking impartiality.

Journalist Antoinette Lattouf arrives at the Federal Court on Wednesday. Picture: NewsWire/Nikki Short

ABC managing director David Anderson has conceded that several high-profile journalists at the public broadcaster – including Laura Tingle, John Lyons, Patricia Karvelas and Paul Barry – have never been taken off-air, despite making public comments that could be construed as “contentious” or lacking impartiality.

Mr Anderson was called to the witness stand in the Federal Court in Sydney on Wednesday to give evidence in the unfair dismissal case brought by freelance journalist Antoinette Lattouf against the ABC.

Lattouf was sacked by the ABC in December 2023 three days into a five-day contract to present the morning show in the week before Christmas.

She was fired after the ABC learned she had shared a post by Human Rights Watch on Instagram, with a caption that read: “HRW reporting starvation as a tool of war”.

Lattouf was dismissed after the ABC ruled that by uploading the HRW image and headline to ­Instagram, she had disobeyed a ­direction from one of the broadcaster’s managers earlier in the week to be mindful of what she posted regarding the “Israel-­Palestine situation, and warned not to “give anyone ammunition for complaints”.

Earlier in the week, Lattouf told the court she had been given permission by an ABC manager to post statements only from “reputable sources”, and told she should stick to “facts”.

Under cross-examination by Lattouf’s barrister, Oshie Fagir, on Wednesday, Mr Anderson was asked whether he agreed with the way the ABC’s then chief content officer Chris Oliver-Taylor – who made the decision to terminate the stand-in-presenter’s contract – had handled her dismissal.

“If Mr Oliver-Taylor had his time over again, he might have sought additional advice from other people before he made his decision … there was potentially a step missing, with regard to this issue, but it might have had the same ending,” Mr Anderson said.

Pushed further, the ABC boss said: “Hindsight is a wonderful thing. You would like to have seen that there was certainly a discussion with Ms Lattouf to find out the motivation behind what I believed at the time was disobeying a direction, and then tried to ascertain what the resulting risk was.”

Mr Fagir asked Mr Anderson: “Does the ABC report the news impartially?”

Mr Anderson replied: “Yes, we have occasional breaches, but yes.”

Lattouf’s barrister then probed the ABC on how the public broadcaster handled “contentious” issues, and whether certain state­ments by some of its high-profile journalists breached the organisation’s impartiality requirement.

Mr Fagir cited comments made last year by ABC 7.30’s chief political correspondent Tingle about Peter Dutton’s immigration policies; former Media Watch host Barry’s post on social media last October that “Israel is killing journalists again”; global affairs editor Lyons’s statements on the conflict on the Middle East; and former Radio National presenter Karvelas’s criticisms of the “Murdoch press”.

Mr Anderson agreed that the comments made by the journalists had lacked impartiality, and confirmed that while some had been “counselled”, none of them was taken off-air as a result of public statements or social media posts.

“They’re not removed from air if it’s not a problem,” he said.

ABC managing director David Anderson outside the Federal Court in Sydney on Wednesday. Picture: NewsWire / Nikki Short

Mr Anderson clarified that he hadn’t been made aware of the anti-Israel post by Barry, who has since left the ABC, and said he couldn’t offer an assessment on whether the cited comments by Karvelas were partial or impartial.

However, he did defend ­Tingle’s public statement last year that “Australia is a racist country”, and disagreed with Mr Fagir’s suggestion that it was a “contentious statement”.

“I have no problem with that statement, because it is based in fact, that we have a history of ­racism,” Mr Anderson said.

He denied the suggestion that there was one rule for certain journalists at the ABC and another rule for others, saying any alleged breaches of the organisation’s editorial or social media guidelines were handled on a case-by-case basis.

Earlier on Wednesday, the court heard that Lattouf had been hired to fill in for regular morning show host Sarah Macdonald under the ABC’s “diversity policy”.

ABC journalist Laura Tingle.

Patricia Karvelas.

“As part of our diversity policy, a number of future ABC presenters were identified … Antoinette was one of them,” ABC Radio Sydney manager Steve Ahern wrote in an email.

The court was also told that senior figures within the ABC, including Mr Anderson and then chair Ita Buttrose, had expressed serious reservations about ­Lattouf’s “perceived or actual lack of impartiality” after her first shift on-air on Monday, December 18, 2023.

However, it was agreed that Lattouf would be allowed to complete her week-long contract, albeit on the understanding that “it would be best” if she didn’t mention the “Israel-Palestine situation” either on-air or on social media.

However, when Mr Oliver-Taylor learned on the afternoon of Wednesday, December 20, that Lattouf had posted the HRW image and caption on her Instagram page the previous day, he made the decision to terminate her contract, two days before it was due to expire.

Mr Anderson will continue to give evidence when the hearing resumes on Thursday.