Labor mulls future of ABC board after director Fiona Balfour quits
The broadcaster has lost another Coalition board appointee, with Fiona Balfour leaving more than three years before her term was due to expire.
The ABC has lost another Coalition appointee from its board, with Fiona Balfour resigning from the public broadcaster more than three years before her term was due to expire.
The former chief information officer at Qantas and Telstra was one of former prime minister Scott Morrison’s so-called “captain’s picks” for the ABC board in May 2021, with the appointment prompting criticism at the time that the Coalition government was stacking the board with its political allies.
But Ms Balfour’s sudden departure at the end of January, just weeks after businessman Joe Gersh was told by Communications Minister Michelle Rowland that his term would not be extended upon its expiry in May, has raised questions about the government’s plans for the make-up of the board of the taxpayer-funded media organisation.
The ABC Act (1983) states that in addition to the chairman, the managing director and the staff-elected director, there can be no fewer than four and no more than six directors on the board.
With the resignation of Ms Balfour and the looming departure of Mr Gersh, it is feasible that the government could install three new directors to the board before the next federal election.
It is also likely that current chairwoman Ita Buttrose will depart the ABC when her term expires in March next year, while it remains uncertain whether managing director David Anderson will seek an extension to his five-year tenure as the organisation’s most senior editorial figure when his current tenure ends in May 2024.
The impending vacancies on the board leaves the government with the option to put its own stamp on the public broadcaster’s board.
In September 2018, the then Labor opposition communications spokeswoman, Michelle Rowland – who now has carriage of the portfolio in government – expressed concern about the “independence and integrity” of the ABC, and insisted that “it must remain free from political interference”.
Board members are selected by the government of the day – either as a direct “captain’s pick”, or after being short-listed by an independent nomination panel process, conducted by a four-person panel.
On Sunday, a spokeswoman for Ms Rowland said the minister played no role in Ms Balfour’s decision to resign.
“The ABC chairman wrote to the minister on 30 January, 2023, to advise that Ms Balfour had written to the Governor-General to tender her resignation as a non-executive director on the ABC Board, effective from 31 January, 2023,” she said.
“A merit-based selection process will be undertaken by the nomination panel … to fill this vacancy”.
The government’s selection process for a replacement for Mr Gersh, who was appointed to the board by then communications minister Mitch Fifield in 2018, is already under way, while the hunt for a replacement for Ms Balfour has not commenced.
Ms Balfour was the subject of a review conducted by the new government last year, after concerns were raised over a potential conflict of interest relating to her appointment to the board of Digicel, a subsidiary of Telstra.
While the review has been finalised and handed to the ABC, the findings have not yet been made public.
However, it’s believed that Ms Buttrose and Ms Balfour had not seen eye-to-eye over the perceived conflict of interest.
Ms Balfour formally informed the board of her departure at the end of last month, more than three years before her term was due to expire in May 2026, and her photo and biography have subsequently been removed from the ABC board page.
Ms Balfour told The Australian: “It would not be appropriate for me to comment on governance issues at a board I have recently left.”
Ms Balfour joined the ABC board last May, at the same time as former Foxtel chief executive Peter Tonagh and former Seven executive Mario D’Orazio.
Other current directors include businesswoman Georgie Somerset, who was reappointed to the board for a second five-year term in 2022, and former media executive Peter Lewis, who will remain on the board until October 2024.
The term of the current staff-elected director, Jane Connors, expires in April this year, with journalists Laura Tingle and Indira Naidoo among those vying for that vacancy.
Ms Buttrose told The Australian on Sunday night: “As this is an ABC board matter, I will decline to comment.”
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