Peter Dutton’s predecessor as Coalition leader, former PM Scott Morrison, famously made a sport of boycotting nearly every ABC program imaginable.
The most longstanding refusal by Morrison – who famously had a fractious relationship with the ABC – to appear on the public broadcaster came with Q+A. Diary’s research shows that Morrison hasn’t appeared on the ABC’s flagship panel show in any form for 11 long years.
But perhaps mindful there is now no Liberal government on the Australian mainland after Saturday’s NSW defeat, Dutton has made a point of markedly differentiating himself from Morrison when it comes to the ABC.
Diary’s research shows that Dutton has made himself highly visible on the public broadcaster since becoming Liberal leader 10 months ago.
Our numbers show that Dutton has appeared on various ABC programs 15 times in six months, including appearances on 7.30, Insiders, AM, Four Corners, ABC News Breakfast and RN Breakfast.
During March alone, Dutton has made two high-profile appearances: with Sarah Ferguson on 7.30 about the AUKUS deal, and on ABC Radio Melbourne’s drive show with Raf Epstein. His busiest month was October, when he appeared five times on ABC shows Insiders, ABC News Breakfast, 7.30, AM and RN Breakfast.
A Coalition insider noted Dutton isn’t afraid to front up to a wide range of audiences – even on the ABC, which has traditionally not been the favoured broadcaster for the Liberals.
“It’s important for the shadow ministry to get the message out to a wide range of media forums – and that includes the national broadcaster,” the insider said.
There’s just one prominent ABC show Dutton hasn’t appeared on recently. It is, you guessed it, Morrison’s least favourite show, Q+A. We’re sure the Opposition Leader will rectify that omission shortly.
Nine goes nuclear in stand-off with Paul Barry
Hostilities are escalating in the stand-off between Paul Barry and The Sydney Morning Herald’s editor Bevan Shields over criticism by Barry on the ABC’s Media Watch program of Nine’s recent Red Alert series on the China threat.
Barry claimed on his show that the series – which claimed Australia could go to war with China within three years – was alarmist. But Nine remains upset with the Media Watch segment because Barry did not seek comment from either the SMH or The Age.
Diary has learnt a furious letter was fired off during the week by Nine’s four top newspaper editors: Tory Maguire, editor-in-chief of the Herald and The Age; David King, national editor of the two papers; The Age editor Patrick Elligett, and Shields, to the ABC.
The letter took the form of a full-blown official complaint, addressed to both ABC chair Ita Buttrose and managing director David Anderson. The demand made of Buttrose and Anderson is that Barry make an on-air apology for not coming to the Nine papers for comment over the segment run on Media Watch two weeks ago.
The complaint letter is understood to have been forwarded to the recently appointed ABC ombudsman, Fiona Cameron.
Barry claimed on Media Watch that both the Herald and The Age had not treated the issue of the China threat “responsibly” in the marathon three-day series, accusing the papers of “alarming” and “extraordinary stuff”.
The Media Watch host later confirmed he hadn’t gone to the Nine papers for a comment because “they have their own megaphone” through their own editorial pages.
In the letter, the four Nine editors have focused on the issue of their “right of reply” to Media Watch’s claims, with the complaint set to be examined under section 5.3 of the ABC’s Editorial Policies which deals with seeking comment. Under the heading “Opportunity to Respond”, that section notes “where allegations are made about a person or organisation, make reasonable efforts in the circumstances to provide a fair opportunity to respond”.
Barry told Diary in last week’s column that by quoting the papers’ defence and summarising their editorial on the matter, Media Watch had given the Nine papers a fair hearing. “If they’ve already presented their defence in an editorial, what else are they going to say to us?,” he said.
But Shields stated in the same column: “They’ve formed their judgment without embarking on the most basic tenet of journalism, which is when you write about someone, you ask them for comment.” Shields went on to note “the excuse that he offered that the Herald has a megaphone and he doesn’t have to come to us for comment is ridiculous. By Paul’s logic, when we write about the ABC, we would never have to approach them for comment.”
Sources say one point made in Nine’s complaint to Buttrose and Anderson is that not seeking comment is something Media Watch has previously criticised others for.
However, Media Watch has historically been allowed more latitude than other ABC programs because it is a commentary and opinion-based show, and doesn’t come under the public broadcaster’s news and current affairs division.
When Diary contacted Barry on Friday about the Nine letter to ABC bosses, he issued a firm “no comment”.
Chairman Dan bans media from China trip
Why is Victorian Premier Dan Andrews allowing no Australian media on his hurriedly announced trip to China on Monday night?
It seems to be a case of Chairman Dan adopting the Chinese government culture of explaining as little as possible to the public.
The trip was revealed with the sort of military precision and secrecy the Chinese Communist Party is famous for.
The tour was revealed through the Sunday newspapers – little more than 24 hours before Andrews actually jets out. And it was announced without a list of the Chinese officials Andrews plans to meet.
On Sunday, Andrews was typically defiant in the face of complaints about what the media saw as secrecy and a lack of transparency.
“We’re having a series of meetings back to back, and I don’t think I’ve taken media on every trip I’ve ever done,” Andrews said.
“There’ll be other trips this year to lots of different parts of the world, potentially. We still haven’t firmed that up. But you’ll be appropriately invited to those. We’ve made our choice. You can have a view on that. That’s entirely your job.”
Andrews, of course, has plenty of history in deal-making with China: most notably his Belt and Road agreement, which was torn up by the Morrison government in 2021, because it was “adverse to our foreign relations”.
Part of the problem from Andrews’ perspective might be the photographs that could be snapped by the travelling media on such a visit.
One photo posted to Twitter of Andrews on his mobile phone in front of a portrait of Chairman Mao Zedong on Tiananmen Square in 2015 is rolled out whenever Andrews’ relationship with China makes the news.
Neil Mitchell, the 3AW host and noted Andrews critic, said on Sunday that the lack of media on the trip was “certainly a bad look”.
Tongue firmly planted in cheek, he hinted at another purpose to Andrews’ China visit: “He’s involved in so many inquiries in Victoria, that it wouldn’t be surprising if he sought asylum there!”
Four more years for Green
The man who has dominated ABC election nights for decades, Antony Green, caused a few heart palpitations when he responded early in the night whether he would call the NSW election for Labor and Chris Minns.
Green resolutely refused to make a premature call: “As I come to the end of my political career, I don’t want to go out on a howler.”
ABC insiders were a tad worried by the implication in the response the end may be nigh for Green – who is the biggest drawcard for the public broadcaster’s election coverage. So Diary directly asked Green, 63, if he’s on the verge of retirement.
The ABC election guru responded that while he was “not going on forever”, he has at least one full cycle of state and federal elections in him. “The next NSW election is in March 2027, and I hit the official retiring age of 67 that month. That means I’ve probably got one cycle of every state election, and a federal election, in me.”
The night went generally smoothly for Green, apart from one minor blip when he was on the cusp of announcing an outright Labor majority of 47 seats. Just as the fanfares sounded for Green to make the big call, his computers put a couple of seats back into undecided territory.
Meanwhile, the night’s co-presenter, Insiders host David Speers, won an ABC internal sweepstakes among staff for the exact time Green would officially call the election for Labor.
Speers’ prediction was 8.15pm. For the record, Green made his Labor victory call at 7.53pm.
Politics: The ultimate game of Survivor
Campaigning among the branches to win a vote. Stabbing an ally in the back. Secretly organising a caucus of support to blindside and unseat a leader.
No, we’re not talking about what happened at Saturday’s NSW election, which saw Dominic Perrottet unceremoniously dumped as the state’s premier after 12 years of Liberal rule.
Rather, on Monday night, it will be revealed whether the most feared and ruthless player ever in the Australian history of reality show Survivor, George “The King of Bankstown” Mladenov, will finally become sole survivor and seize the show’s $500,000 first prize.
What makes parallels between politics and Survivor so apt is that King George is the first seasoned operator from politics to ever contest the show. The man who Survivor fans either love or hate was president of the Labor Party’s branch in Bankstown (in western Sydney heartland) for a decade, and political adviser to ex-NSW shadow minister TaniaMihailuk.
Mladenov left the ALP late last year in mysterious circumstances, amid suggestions he was unhappy about a lack of local candidates in Western Sydney under the now premier-elect Chris Minns. Mladenov refuses to dump on his former leader to Diary: “I decided to leave the Labor Party. At this point, my life and career have gone in a different direction.”
As he enters the finale for his second consecutive time on the show, King George says the similarities between succeeding in Survivor and in politics are uncanny.
“I think being the first former political staffer or branch operative to play Survivor is the reason I have succeeded,” he tells Diary. “At its core, Survivor is about campaigning. And what you learn from being a branch operative in Labor politics is your branch members are the most important people in your world, full stop. You campaign for every branch member, because they vote at every preselection. And that’s exactly the same way I treat every Tribal Council on Survivor.”
Indeed, King George says he has adopted identical techniques to campaigning among the tree branches with Survivor tribemates as he does in political branches. “I’ve been a campaign director for multiple elections at a state and local level,” he says. “When I campaign, I lean into people’s motivations and priorities, and I build my campaign on that. My political instinct has really enabled me to be the best Survivor player ever.”
No false modesty, then, for Mladenov, who has knifed many of his castmates to make it so far in Survivor twice. But he is gambling on the fact many who he has blindsided to vote off the show – who now make up the show’s jury for the finale – could still vote in his favour, out of respect for his spectacular manoeuvres: “There’s nothing returning tribemates respect more than playing the game of Survivor hard,” he says.
And his Survivor election prediction? Mladenov remains supremely confident. “My faction is always the successful faction in the Survivor Party,” he says. “That’s my take on the electorate, so hopefully I’ve got that one right. I don’t want to have egg on my face like Dominic Perrottet.”
Dramas at 2GB after losing Sydney crown
The recriminations have already begun inside 2GB, after the shock of losing its crown as Sydney’s top-rated station for the first time in 18 years.
While breakfast host Ben Fordham (second), morning presenter Ray Hadley (first) and night-time host John Stanley (first) continue to perform more than competitively, some insiders have turned their blowtorches on to shows airing between noon and 6pm on weekdays. They claim that the station’s afternoon show, hosted by Deb Knight, and the ghost of the failed experiment of departed drive host Jim Wilson, are key reasons as to why 2GB’s ratings are under pressure.
The major problem is the 2GB audience, who only four years ago were rusted onto the station throughout the day, are listening to it for the least number of hours in decades.
In the first survey of 2019, under a previous line-up that included Fordham, Hadley and Alan Jones, average “time spent listening” to 2GB stood at a whopping 16.02 hours per week.
But in the corresponding first survey in 2023, time spent listening had collapsed to 10.23 hours per week. That’s a fall of 36.5 per cent in four years.
While Fordham and Hadley rate a healthy 14 per cent of the audience, Knight is running fourth, with an audience share of 7.7 per cent. Meanwhile, new drive host Chris O’Keefe managed fifth, upping his share by 0.4 per cent to 6.3 per cent from the lows left by Wilson at the end of 2022.
The insiders say O’Keefe has settled in well, but was handed a “shit sandwich” in the drive timeslot, given Wilson’s battling ratings before he left.
Meanwhile, in an attempt to boost “time spent listening” to 2GB, the station’s management this year ran a Pass the Bucks promotion, where code words to win a $1000 prize were given on Knight and O’Keefe’s show to phone in during Hadley and Fordham’s timeslots. But will a $1000 prize be enough incentive?
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