Media Watch challenges fact check on Peta Credlin’s Uluru Statement report

ABC Media Watch host Paul Barry has disputed a ‘false information’ label put on Peta Credlin’s reports that the Uluru Statement is 26 pages long.

ABC Media Watch host Paul Barry has disputed a “false information” label put on Sky News host and News Corp columnist Peta Credlin’s reports that the Uluru Statement from the Heart is 26 pages long.

RMIT University’s FactLab – which works “hand in hand” with RMIT ABC Fact Check – this month claimed Credlin’s reporting and commentary on the length of the Uluru Statement was incorrect, using statements from Anthony Albanese, voice co-architect Megan Davis and the National Indigenous Australians Agency to justify its analysis.

In Credlin’s column published in The Australian last Thursday, she said she had been censored by big tech and the RMIT fact checkers after a Sky News Facebook post, which had included a video of her discussing the length of the Uluru Statement, was flagged as: “False information. Checked by independent fact-checkers.”

On Monday, Barry said: “The Uluru Statement is expressed on one page, but there are many more pages of notes and background … where matters like a treaty and reparations are raised.

“And given that there may be some point in what Credlin is saying, we think a disputed label would be more appropriate.”

Sky hosts duke it out over the length of the Uluru Statement as Facebook labels a Peta Credlin video ‘false information’. pic.twitter.com/Ghuim8D6LT

— Media Watch (@ABCmediawatch) August 22, 2023

A Meta spokesman told Media Watch the false claim put on Credlin’s editorial “wasn’t us”.

“This fact check was applied by an independent fact checker and not Meta,” the spokesman said.

ABC head of communications Nick Leys contacted The Australian about the masthead’s ­editorial on the matter and claimed it made “incorrect statements about RMIT ABC Fact Check and should be corrected”.

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“The fact check referred to, concerning a column by Peta Credlin, was not conducted by RMIT ABC Fact Check but by RMIT FactLab, a stand-alone ­operation with its own editor and editorial processes which has no financial or editorial relationship with RMIT ABC Fact Check, or the ABC,” he wrote. “The fact checks referred to are published on the RMIT ­FactLab Debunks website, which again has nothing to do with the ABC.”

But the ABC’s RMIT FactLab page states it “works hand-in-hand with RMIT ABC Fact Check, a partnership between RMIT University and the ABC which focuses on fact-checking claims by public figures”.

The website also states Russell Skelton is the director of both RMIT ABC Fact Check and RMIT FactLab.

The RMIT FactLab also works in partnership with Meta to check social media content that is published on Facebook (owned by Meta) and Instagram.

The ABC was asked by The Australian to explain the distinction between the two groups considering the RMIT website states Mr Skelton is the director of both fact-checkers and that it says RMIT FactLab works “hand-in-hand” with RMIT-ABC FactCheck. The ABC did not respond to the request for comments.