Complaints dog Ben Fordham

DIARY has never seen anything other than the charming, cheeky side of Ben Fordham, but the presenter has upset two female producers.

DIARY has never seen anything other than the charming, cheeky side of Ben Fordham's nature, but the gun television and radio presenter has upset two female producers who worked for him. A Today Show producer went to see the show’s executive producer after Fordham reduced her to tears while she was working on the social media segment he used to present, The Buzz. It’s understood the issues arose shortly after the producer started working on the show and the problems have since been resolved.

At 2GB, a young producer ended up leaving, suffering from stress after having a tough time for some weeks while working on Fordham's drive show. Fordham reached out to the woman and her family to try to resolve the issue, and categorically denies playing any role in her departure. When contacted by The Aus­tralian, the woman chose not to speak on the record but said: “There were difficult circumstances and I did leave because of the stress.” In his 20 years in the media industry, Fordham has never had a formal HR complaint recorded against him and is well-known for mentoring young ­journalists.

In February, Fordham told Diary this would be his final year on the Today Show and he was looking to move to 60 Minutes next year. That is not necessarily going to happen. While executive producer Tom Malone would love to have him on board, he needs a full-time reporter — a commitment Fordham is unable to make while hosting his high-rating drive show five days a week at 2GB. Nine bosses are now understood to be looking at ­Europe correspondent Peter Stefanovic to join the 60 Min family. He has played a long-term game and impressed all his superiors.

Reclusive exclusive

NEWS Corp's political reporter Sam Maiden broke the biggest pre-budget yarn so far — the government’s consideration of a deficit levy. Apart from the political fallout for Tony Abbott, the story caused a bit of drama last week.

The morning the story broke, ABC Insiders host Fran Kelly sounded highly dubious about its validity. “But a deficit tax? Really?” Kelly asked her panel, leaving the story until halfway through a segment on the Sunday papers.

By Monday night, the ABC treated the story more seriously but 7.30 host Sarah Ferguson said “the idea has been leaked in the run-up to the budget to test the public’s response.” Reporter Sabra Lane agreed it was a drop, saying: “Often around budget time, governments float risky ideas in public to gauge sentiment. It’s known as sending up a balloon. One was floated in News Corp papers yesterday.”

When we called Maiden to ask whether it was a sanctioned drop, she said it absolutely was not, and in fact Joe Hockey initially had refused to speak to her in the commission of audit lock-up. While the ABC couldn’t be expected to acknowledge Maiden's exclusive, The Sunday Telegraph’s sister paper could have. The Daily Telegraph’s Simon Benson wrote the next day that the deficit levy was “first reported two weeks ago” referring to a story in the Australian Financial Review.

Sunday Telegraph editor Mick Carroll was not happy about it and told The Daily Telegraph’s editor Paul Whittaker he should have acknowledged their exclusive. The fact it was first reported in the Fin is a view apparently not shared by the Fin’s editor, Michael Stutchbury, who congratulated Maiden in the audit lock-up on Friday.

Poached Eales

FORMER Wallabies captain John Eales is defecting from the Australian Financial Review to The Australian newspaper as a columnist for both rugby and business, focusing on leadership.

The Australian's editor-in-chief, Chris Mitchell, said it expanded Eales's relationship with News Corp after his signing in February as a Fox Sports presenter and panellist. “I have been trying to lure John Eales to the Oz since 2002 and am thrilled we have been able to do this deal with Fox Sports,’’ he said.

Mitchell first met Eales when, as editor-in-chief of Queensland Newspapers, he presented the then captain of the Queensland Reds with a Courier Mail sport star award. At the time, Mitchell told Eales that he had known his father longer than he had, because his dad had taught him in 1965 at Marist Brothers Ashgrove in ­Brisbane.

Nicholas Gray, chief executive of The Australian, said Fox Sports content was an important part of The Australian offer, especially video highlights embedded in the new edition-based iPad App. “We hope to do more appointments across the two brands,” he said.

It seems the Fin is struggling to keep employees on board: Eales is the fourth person to defect to The Australian this year.

Caring for kids

MURDOCH Children’s Research Institute ambassador and board member Sarah Murdoch threw an elegant garden party lunch to raise money for the foundation and to honour Dame Elisabeth Murdoch on Friday.

Murdoch, who looked stunning in Alex Perry, was joined by the country’s A-list women at Boomerang, the waterfront Sydney home of Lindsay and Paula Fox. Paula hosted the luncheon, attended by Ros Packer, Judy Paterson, Collette Dinnigan, Alex Perry, Georgie Gardner, Natalie Barr, Edwina Bartholomew, Kellie Hush, Christine Mansfield, Julie Gibbs, Ashley Dawson-Damer, Edwina McCann and Helen McCabe.

Brian Kirk reduced many in the room to tears with his story of his eight-year-old daughter Miranda’s lifelong battle with mitochondrial disease. Today Show host Lisa Wilkinson did a wonderful job as MC, telling Kirk that Miranda had hit the jackpot having him as a father.

NSW Governor Marie Bashir spoke of her time as a young medical graduate at the Royal ­Alexandra Hospital for Children, Camperdown, where she would go behind the bookcase to cry because she knew 100 per cent of the children suffering blood-related cancers like leukaemia would die.

“Look at today, 85 per cent cured. It’s wonderful, the medical research,’’ she said.

Many of today’s political leaders could learn from Bashir, who told Diary she chose to finish her term this year so as not to outdo Roden Cutler.

“I have elected to go so I’d be a bit below Sir Roden Cutler. If I went longer I’d have been the longest-serving governor and I think Sir Roden Cutler should remain,’’ she said.

“I’m the second-longest-­serving governor and Lachlan Macquarie is the third … It’s R.E.S.P.E.C.T.”

What rare reverence. She will be missed in the role.

Carpark rage

THERE is far less respect at the ABC. We know how feisty ABC-types can get on twitter. (Ping Paul Barry, Drum columnist Jonathan Holmes and the mysterious ABC News Intern.) But if straight news reports get the ABC knickers in a twist, imagine the tension when there is nowhere to park at the ABC parking lot. It seems the situation is not pretty. “In recent weeks, unauthorised parking at Ultimo Centre has risen to a dangerous and un­acceptable level,’’ an internal note says. “The unsafe parking, frayed tempers and verbal abuse evident in recent weeks has forced us to implement new measures.”

The note says there will be random audits conducted after Monday June 15. We’re not sure where the tempers have been most frayed — B3, where the executives and high-profile personalities park, or other levels.

Luckily for Mark Scott, he is entitled to the use of a taxpayer-funded Comcar ensuring immunity from such petty squabbles.

Daily Mail fail

THERE has been an exodus of young reporters from News Corp’s News.com.au and The Daily Telegraph to new player, The Daily Mail Australia, a partnership between Mi9 and The Daily Mail General Trust.

But it seems Tele reporter Nathan Klein couldn’t last more than three months at The Daily Mail, handing in his resignation to pursue a career in real estate, apparently a new passion of his.

He thanked the team at Mi9 for employing him and said he left with good will.

The Daily Mail, which has moved to six in the Nielsen rankings, has filled over 40 of its 50 positions — the majority Australian journalists.

One reporter was brought from Britain and three from the states, “because they’re showbiz reporters and have had experience on the site for many years”. “They’re seasoned Mail online lands,’’ says Daily mail spokesman, Sean Walsh.

Daily Mail Australia editor Luke McIlveen is in Britain where he is spending two months working closely with the site’s global publisher, Martin Clarke.

Funny Business

CitiGroup’s CEO Stephen Roberts was awfully embarrassed by the comedian hired to MC their annual finance journalism awards on Thursday night.

Roberts apologised to some attendees, saying he was horrified by comedian Tom Gleeson’s sexist jokes and coarse language, which Diary will not repeat.

“That won’t happen again,’’ he told one journalist.

It’s understood Dick Warburton was also appalled.

But Diary found the comedian hilarious and thought more embarrassing was the fact the audience was kept waiting to hear a speech by last year’s winner James Chessell, who was running late.

He was coming from his farewell drinks, which were just around the corner at Bambini wine bar.

Winner of this year’s award, Four Corners’ Stephen Long, gave a speech, more eloquent and sober than Chessell’s, reminding those in the room that “journalism is what someone out there doesn’t want you to know; all the rest is advertising.”

Wise words.

Fairfax hire

FAIRFAX Media is said to be close to appointing a new advertising sales director to replace Ed Harrison, who defected to online rival Yahoo!7 after Fairfax failed in its legal bid to halt the move.

Sources said Fairfax turned to Britain to find someone with the right digital media experience. Chris Ellis, most recently managing director, digital at the Trinity Mirror Group (which includes the Daily Mirror among its titles) is the frontrunner. Fairfax would not respond to queries on the topic late last week but Ellis’ LinkedIn entry confirms he’s already in Australia. “I will be leaving Trinity Mirror at the end of April and relocating to Australia later in 2014 for family reasons,” it says. Ellis is a former European chief operating officer of MySpace, and spent two years as managing director, international for IGN Entertainment. He has also worked at AOL, as senior vice-president for Europe.

Cleo loses its man

What has happened to Cleo’s Bachelor awards.

The winner of Cleo Bachelor of the Year is usually announced in the May or June issue, but there is no sign of the all-male contest so far.

For the first time, it has been pushed back to later in the year. But sources say there has been difficulty attracting advertising sponsors for Bachelor of the Year, which forms a large part of the magazine’s revenue.

There are also questions about Cleo’s future after its circulation continues to slip.

There have been discussions over whether it would be better to move the magazine entirely into the digital space, given its demographic is largely online.