A ‘mistake’ for ABC to hire Antoinette Lattouf: David Anderson

The outgoing ABC managing director says it was a ‘mistake’ to hire journalist Antoinette Lattouf as a fill-in radio host two months after the Hamas attack on Israel, considering her public ‘partisan’ views on the Middle East conflict.

Journalist Antoinette Lattouf leaves the Federal Court. Picture: NewsWire/ Damian Shaw.

Outgoing ABC managing director David Anderson says it was a “mistake” to hire journalist Antoinette Lattouf as a fill-in talkback radio host two months after the Hamas attack on Israel, considering her public “partisan” views on the Middle East conflict.

Mr Anderson told the Federal Court on Thursday he was “surprised” by the decision to sack Lattouf in the middle of her five-day contract, despite having personally investigated her social media use and finding “anti-Semitic messages based within them”.

However, he said there was an “error of judgment” when hiring Lattouf, and there were “other more appropriate people” to host the show who did hold public views on an ongoing, contentious issue.

“I had concerns it was possible Ms Lattouf would say similar statements while on air on Radio Sydney while hosting live talkback,” he said. “It’s possible she could do it …. I was worried about that happening, I was worried about a caller going through and wanting to talk about it.”

Outgoing ABC Managing Director David Anderson. Picture: Nikki Short

Mr Anderson on Thursday gave evidence for the second day in Lattouf’s case against the public broadcaster over whether she was unfairly dismissed after she shared a social post from Human Rights Watch about the Israel-Gaza war with the caption: “HRW reporting starvation as a tool of war”.

She was let go from the temporary gig after completing three of her five shifts.

Lattouf’s barrister, Oshie Fagir, on Thursday draw comparison between the treatment of other high-profile ABC personalities - including political correspondent Laura Tingle and former Media Watch host Paul Barry - and Lattouf.

Mr Anderson, when pressed on comments made by chief political correspondent Laura Tingle that Australia is a “racist country”, said the reporter was not sanctioned because the statements were “based in fact”.

He said that although “millions” of Australians might disagree with the statement made by Tingle, it was “just a statement of fact” and therefore “not worthy of a sanction”.

“When we looked at it in regard to whether or not we felt it warranted a sanction or counsel we took into account the context in which that was given and we determined that did not warrant a sanction,” he said.

Laura Tingle.

Mr Fagir put to Mr Anderson that the ABC allows “arbitrary, subjective judgment” when determining whether an employee has engaged in misconduct and if they are worthy of a sanction.

“I don’t agree with it being arbitrary in that that to me suggest that there isn’t judgment that is exercised that is in line with what I would expect the assessment to be,” Mr Anderson replied. “I expect the assessment to be against the clear expectations we have for our employees … and there is still subjective judgment to be made as to whether a sanction is warranted or not.”

The court heard Mr Anderson conducted a private audit of Lattouf’s social media accounts once the ABC was flooded with near-identical complaints about her “impartiality”.

Mr Fagir asked “how on earth” Mr Anderson “came to be trawling the social media accounts of a five day casual of a Monday evening?”

Mr Anderson said he was “concerned” about the substance of the complaints, and “it has happened form time to time that I have looked up people’s social media who have worked with the ABC”.

Lattouf’s “social feeds had anti-Semitic messages based within them”, Mr Anderson said, adding that some of the posts were “challenging the existence of Israel”.

He forwarded screenshots of the posts to then-ABC chief content officer Christopher Oliver-Taylor, hoping he would “manage the risk” of the situation. Measures were put in place to ensure Lattouf did not discuss controversial topics live on air.

“I still had concerns that we had put someone with a publicly stated partisan position on a current contentious issue hosting talkback radio with the community,” he said. “How that happened was certainly remaining of concern (but I) was satisfied with the mitigants (sic) put in place til the end of the week”

Mr Anderson said Lattouf was taken off air three days into her contract after Mr Oliver-Taylor discovered she had shared the HRW post on her account.
“It was unexpected … I didn’t expect that issue to arise again, I thought that issue had been put to bed and Ms Lattouf was presenting til the end of the week,” he said.

He rejected Mr Fagir’s suggestion that he was “happy for Ms Lattouf to be gone”.

Mr Fagir: “You were not about to interrogate any decision to take her off the air because that’s what you wanted.”

Mr Anderson: “No, that is not correct.”

Former acting ABC Radio Sydney Manager Mark Spurway told the court on Thursday he ensured Lattouf was paid out for the remainder of her shifts, despite being let go with two days left on her contract.

He rejected a suggestion that he did so to “assist the ABC in the litigation Ms Lattouf had commenced” in the Fair Work Commission.

“Not at all,” he said. “I thought it was the fair thing to do and I made that call the same day Ms Lattouf left the ABC.”

The hearing continues.