“Stop talking about the economy.” That was the instruction last week from Emma Alberici — allegedly the ABC’s chief economics correspondent — to her 125,000 Twitter followers, despite the great fallout from the coronavirus on the economy.
Alberici reckons the economy is almost incidental in the time of coronavirus. “We live in a community not an economy,” she philosophically tweeted on Wednesday. Clearly the words of a person who still has a job!
Alberici also preached such laudable principles as choosing “love over hate” and knocking on “your neighbour’s door” — although we’re not sure how that last one would go down with Dr Norman Swan, given his constant refrain of social distancing.
It would be an understatement to say Alberici’s tweet divided opinion. Supporters of Alberici wholeheartedly agreed the government was “treating this pandemic as an economic problem rather than a life-threatening health problem”. But numerous other respondents dissented, arguing a pandemic was inextricably linked with the economy: “Respectfully, for some people these economic decisions are life and death … You can’t self-isolate if you’re evicted,” one said.
People around the world are dying alone Stop talking about the economy. We live in a community not an economy. Go knock on your neighbour's door & ask if they need help Look after eachother
— Emma Alberici (@albericie) March 25, 2020
And learn a lesson from Italy Choose love over hate
Stay inside. Only go out if you must
Jones v Joyce war goes viral
They’re calling it Jones v Joyce II. Last year, Alan Jones lobbed a huge grenade when he accused Qantas boss Alan Joyce of pressuring Rugby Australia (of which Qantas is the major sponsor) into its explosive sacking of Israel Folau for anti-gay comments. For his part, Joyce described Jones’s claim as “outrageous”.
But last Thursday on his 2GB show, Jones doubled down by opening up another front against Qantas, this time involving the coronavirus.
In the nine months since the Folau hostilities erupted, what has become clear to Diary is the enmity between Jones and Joyce over the Folau affair never went away. Diary’s research suggests Joyce hasn’t been on Jones’s show for more than five years.
And so to the latest eruption in the AJ vs AJ affair on Thursday. Jones’s most explosive claim was The Flying Kangaroo had helped hasten the spread of coronavirus in Australia by pressing ahead with direct flights from the virus’s original epicentre, China to Australia, and at the time, playing down the risk.
“Way back in February, I was arguing to the Prime Minister and the Foreign Minister against Qantas continuing to operate direct flights to and from China. Mr Joyce, God knows what that has done, as you continued to fly, to accelerate the spread of the coronavirus here.”
And that was just the entree. Jones went on to accuse Joyce personally of “ugly behaviour” and “bucketing” his major competitor, Virgin Australia, amid reported comments relating to Virgin that governments should not be in the business of supporting companies that had been “badly managed” for years. Jones also claimed to have an “audio recording” of Joyce urging his staff on a conference call “to petition their federal MPs against Virgin”.
Jones also lashed out at a recent newspaper “puff piece” about Joyce, suggesting the Qantas boss was “a darling of the media because he opposed Israel Folau and supported same sex marriage”.
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POO hygiene fear
Some production staff on Seven’s new cooking show, Plate of Origin (POO), starring Matt Preston and Gary Mehigan, were last week deeply concerned about the risks of continuing filming on the program, Diary has learned.
Senior Seven sources claim the early feedback on the actual content of the show is strong, contrary to initial buzz.
But that may prove to be academic. Some insiders on the production that was shooting indoors on Sunday were very nervous that about 70 POO cast and crew were on set last week in a northwestern Sydney mansion.
Diary has obtained texts from POO’s production hub in Dural, which show at least some crew anxious about the risks of catching COVID-19, given that filming is still has a few weeks to go.
And not even the lure of a free case of beer of their choice — which has been dangled by Seven production bosses to each POO staffer as a carrot to keep on going — has eased their fears.
One person working on the show texted last week: “It’s not safe to be honest. I mean how can you keep apart … it’s not worth the risk.” The staffer’s texts go on to say that “hand sani” is being dispensed, but everyone on the set is “quite close”. So why is filming of a whole cooking show still on, at a time when the rest of us can’t hold a barbecue? “The argument or conversation (from production bosses) at work is that ‘we are essential services’,” the staffer said.
Essential services? Eat your heart out, intensive care nurses!
Another POO staffer texted Seven would be “lucky to get another week” of filming in. But the staffer is blunt about the network’s attitude to pressing ahead with POO: “I don’t think they give a shit unfortunately. Just trying to squeeze every bit of life out of something that is already dead.” Ouch.
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Swan song hits a nerve
It has been the talk of the Canberra press gallery: an alleged cranky phone call last Thursday week between a staffer in Scott Morrison’s office and the ABC’s news and current affairs supremo Gaven Morris. The alleged subject? Dr Norman Swan.
But when Diary reached Morris last week, he was adamant there was no hostility expressed by “any government source” to him “at any level” about the ABC’s COVID-19 coverage as the crisis has escalated, including Swan’s.
It has been claimed the government had been worried about inconsistency in the messaging of Swan, the face of the ABC’s coronavirus coverage, and that of Australia’s chief medical officer Brendan Murphy.
Whispers around Canberra suggested the PM’s office was worried that Swan’s messaging was at odds with Murphy’s in some instances, particularly in the early escalation of the crisis.
But Morris told Diary: “I haven’t had any government source get in touch with me and complain about any ABC coverage at any level. If they have complained, they haven’t got in touch with me.”
Morris made no further comment. However, Swan last week hinted lines of communication with Murphy had been opened, as he appeared to slightly soften his stance towards the government.
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Uhlmann’s ABC swipe
Three years on from his departure from the ABC to become Nine’s new Laurie Oakes, Chris Uhlmann has delivered a veiled dig at his former colleagues at Aunty.
Uhlmann was with the ABC for nearly two decades, but it seems his recent absence has not made his heart grow fonder.
His target appears to be a degree of recent self-congratulation at his former employer over its coverage of the emerging coronavirus pandemic.
“My network doesn’t spend time congratulating itself on delivering news, it just does the job,” he tweeted on Thursday. “World class, all day, without agendas.”
He also did not miss the opportunity to subtly highlight the differences between Nine, as a commercial organisation that can only survive if ad revenue is adequate to fund its costs, and publicly funded broadcasters. He worked, he said, for a “team working extra hours for free facing a catastrophic collapse in advertising that will threaten our jobs. Could not be prouder.”
It’s not the first time Uhlmann has made it clear whose side he’s on these days. Last year, at the farewell to the ABC’s Jon Faine in Melbourne, Uhlmann said “commercial news media faces pressures the ABC cannot imagine”.
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Mitchell-Andrews truce
Melbourne’s most powerful broadcaster, Neil Mitchell, wants the coronavirus to be the watershed moment that finally ends his longstanding cold war with the city’s most powerful politician, Daniel Andrews.
Mitchell is using Diary to call for a “truce” with the Victorian Premier, following the unprecedented events of recent days.
The 3AW morning presenter believes Andrews’s boycott of his show comes down to a testy interview between the pair in 2017, when Mitchell accused the Premier at the time of “political trickery”.
As Mitchell now freely confides: “He was not happy with this interview and not happy with my editorials on several stories.”
But three years on, Mitchell believes it is time for the pair to put their differences aside.
“I believe we should call a truce, pending the end of this virus. I think it is important that the Premier talk to as many people as broadly as he can, and that includes my audience.
He has also made a solemn promise to Andrews as an incentive: “I will not ask any of the million questions I have on other issues. “Now is not the time to be fighting with anybody, nor is it the time to be sniping. I won’t do either.”
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Little league in trouble
“No play, no pay.” That was the unequivocal position of the nation’s top broadcasting bosses towards increasingly desperate sporting body chiefs last week. We’re assured Nine, Seven and Foxtel are on the same page when it comes to withholding fees to the cash-strapped NRL and AFL.
So critical was the need for talks that NRL CEO Todd Greenberg and chief commercial officer Andrew Abdo abandoned the new protocols of holding business meetings by Skype or Zoom in favour of face-to-face talks.
Diary understands the NRL pair turned up at Nine’s Willoughby bunker last Tuesday to meet Nine CEO Hugh Marks in his third floor office where, we’re assured, appropriate social distancing was observed.
We’re told Greenberg and Abdo held similar meetings with Foxtel bosses later in the week. Perhaps understandably, the media bosses were playing hardball with their chosen sports. Part of the reason is downpayments have been made on future events.
For example, Nine sources say they have already paid some form of deposit on the rights to both the NRL finals and State of Origin, and argue this shows they are well ahead on payments for content unlikely to even be delivered.
As one media insider remarked to us frankly on Sunday: “If they don’t have a game, what exactly are we paying for?”
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AFL callers’ pay hit
Staff at AFL headquarters aren’t the only stakeholders in the game who are in for a long, lean winter.
Diary is reliably informed that some of Seven’s best known AFL commentators, who are not on the network’s full-time payroll, will cop a huge pay hit because they are not covered by the protections afforded by standard staff contracts.
Bruce McAvaney, Basil Zempilas and Hamish McLachlan (the brother of AFL boss Gillon McLachlan) are immune from the cuts, because they are on Seven’s full-time payroll and commentate on events across the sporting year.
But cash-strapped Seven can’t afford to pay for others normally used exclusively for the AFL season — primarily ex-players on casual contracts that mostly see them paid “per game”.
For those unlucky commentators, the pay tap will be turned off altogether until the AFL returns.
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Morgan’s mayhem
It would be fair to say it has been an eventful couple of weeks for the host of the ABC’s The Business, Elysse Morgan.
First she had to self-quarantine a fortnight back, when returning to Australia from the coronavirus hotspot of Colorado after a skiing trip.
But Morgan wasn’t about to let a silly thing like quarantine get in the way of an interview with the country’s most important businessman, Commonwealth Bank CEO Matt Comyn.
Everything was set up, ready to go for her important interview — including the Skype-connected laptop on a box of wine on her ironing board. She even put on a suit jacket to at least look the part while in her loungeroom.
There was just one problem: she had forgotten her phone that would allow her to hear Comyn while conducting the interview. In her barefooted rush to grab it before the interview started, she clipped a door frame, and broke the fourth toe of her left foot. Back in the ABC control room, Diary is told some fruity language was heard as Morgan hobbled back to her makeshift studio.
Diary is told she kept the CBA boss in the dark about her broken toe. But she did confide that she was conducting the interview on the top of a box of wine, a line that elicited a laugh from Comyn, even in these trying times.
If she does not return a positive COVID-19 result, Morgan will triumphantly return to hosting The Business on Tuesday night — hopefully this time wearing shoes for her own safety.
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