Seven boss Anthony De Ceglie slams government for not supporting media

The Albanese government has failed to follow through on its promise to hold social media platforms to account for the damage they have done to journalism, Anthony De Ceglie says.

Seven West Media’s news boss Anthony De Ceglie.

The federal government has failed to follow through on its promise to hold social media platforms to account for the damage they have done to journalism, and to society as a whole, according to Seven West Media’s news boss Anthony De Ceglie.

In a speech to the Melbourne Press Club on Tuesday, De Ceglie will argue that the government has an obligation to ensure mainstream media remains financially viable.

“We are the shining light on the hill in an increasingly dystopian world of conspiracy theorists and deepfakes and anti-vaxxer cookers,” De Ceglie will say in his speech, an excerpt of which has been obtained by The Australian.

“Elon Musk doesn’t care about the truth. In fact, he revels in peddling lies and boasts about using his bin fire of a site to influence the US election.

“Meanwhile, Mark Zuckerberg is seemingly happy for Meta to profit off the page impressions that child sex offenders create when they routinely use his site to prey on their next victim.

“Against these evil forces — and calling them that is not an exaggeration — there is only one true antidote. The news. The truth. The fourth estate. In a world where the proliferation of misinformation has never been worse, our role as journalists has never been more important.

“And the government … needs to realise this and step up to help us. If the Prime Minister is genuinely worried about the toxicity of Facebook and Meta and X and TikTok … then bloody well give a helping hand to the journalism that fights for facts.”

De Ceglie will also call for the government to consider a rebate for the costs of producing news and current affairs, given the future of news organisations’ payment-for-content deals with Meta and Google looks increasingly uncertain.