Shaun Micallef’s On The Sauce part of the ABC’s new wowserism

Shaun Micallef in On the Sauce, an ‘insidious intervention by the public broadcaster’.

Back in the 1970s Norman Gunston used his brilliant ABC television show to promote his availability for a “fabulously well-paid cigarette commercial”.

Those were the days of “Anyhow, have a Winfield” — when Paul Hogan made himself famous and rich by turning cigarette commercials into light entertainment that often outshone the programs they interrupted.

Gunston’s desire for advertising riches was, of course, all part of his joke. Garry McDonald’s satirical genius used Gunston to poke fun at the fame, fortune and, pardon the pun, norms of the time.

Still, reality imitated art, and Gunston did pop up, on horseback, spruiking Dukes cigarettes. They did not seem to be a roaring success but Gunston certainly was, eventually switching to commercial television.

As a taxpayer-funded broadcaster that shuns sponsorship of any kind, the ABC is in a unique position to critique advertising. The successful The Gruen Transfer program works so well because it can expose the tricks, triumphs, and failures of advertising in a way that might be either compromised or self-defeating on commercial television.

Still, I was a little taken aback last week when I decided to check out the ABC’s documentary series about alcohol, On the Sauce. It is cleverly produced and entertaining television which aims to be informative but runs a strong ideological agenda.

Hosted by comedian and teetotaller Shaun Micallef, it is not blind to the benefits of alcohol — social and commercial — but pursues a moral narrative towards abstinence. This is our new wowserism, led not so much by the Methodist Ladies at the Temperance Hall but by public health officials on a sugar tax campaign.

So, On The Sauce is an insidious intervention by the public broadcaster, setting out to shape the nation in its own, woke way, and happily setting itself against industries — wine, brewing, restaurants, hotels and hospitality — that support vast numbers of Australians. Perhaps the ABC wants to do for these industries what it did for the live cattle export industry and greyhound racing.

Anyhow, back to advertising. The jolt I got while sipping my red and watching On The Sauce stemmed from Micallef declaring that “advertising, as we know, is evil” and then confessing that he was “very cynical” about advertising.

And that voice, Micallef’s beautiful speaking voice, it sounded so familiar.

But of course, we hear it all the time. “Did you know that if you accidentally reversed into a lamp post you could choose your own authorised repairer as part of your GIO platinum car insurance,” advises Micallef in one of a plethora of insurance commercials on radio and television. “Sometimes it’s good to know the details,” he guides us. “You know with GIO.”

Through the evils of advertising, Micallef takes out some insurance against the financial vagaries of comedy. Is this the worst case of hypocrisy you could imagine? Probably not. But it might take Micallef spruiking cask wine on Foxtel to beat it.

While we are on hypocrisy, it amuses me that ABC opinionistas sometimes complain that this newspaper and, indeed, this column are “obsessed” with them. Despite the ABC being a vast and vitally important public broadcaster that is perhaps the nation’s most important and influential cultural institution, many of its journalists seem to think it should be beyond scrutiny.

If the nation’s only national broadsheet — a paper conceived to ventilate national policy debates and devoted to national improvement — did not take an abiding interest in the ABC, I do not know who would. A taxpayer-funded organisation receiving more than $1bn annually, employing 4500 people and busying itself covering events and issues across the nation is deserving of some critical examination.

But think about the other way around. Given the incalculable number of commercial, industrial, cultural and other organisations across this nation, and the unprecedented breadth and diversity in media options, why would the ABC be consumed with curiosity (and animosity) about one major commercial media enterprise?

ABC Media Watch host Paul Barry.

Analysis conducted for my Sky News program Kenny on Media last week found that the ABC’s Media Watch program had featured criticism of News Corp in 24 of its 26 programs so far this year. That is some strike rate; to find a higher ratio you would have to consider something like the percentage of ABC journalists who wrongly picked the outcome of the 2019 federal election.

Drilling into individual stories within those episodes, New Corp criticism accounts for almost half (49 per cent) of all Media Watch’s attacks. Compare this to just 5 per cent for the behemoth that is the ABC itself.

Strange isn’t it, that according to this data News Corp is 10 times more worthy of criticism than the ABC. Perhaps Paul Barry and his team of 10 people, who put together 15 minutes of television each week, are not as independent as they pretend.

Maybe they are as independent as they are productive. Barry has directed 18 per cent of his criticism this year towards Sky News (one subscription television station), only 1 per cent lower than the scrutiny he has applied to the entire Nine Media conglomerate incorporating the former Fairfax newspapers, a national television network, a national radio network and online entities.

Yet Media Watch has not found space to criticise The Guardian Australia once — even ignoring revelations it was enticed to this country by Malcolm Turnbull, who even hand-picked the staff. Media Watch clearly exists to defend the green Left and the ABC, and attack News Corp — as well as to get Barry out of the house for one afternoon a week.

It is the height of financial and ideological indulgence that puts the lie to ABC claims about budget constraints and objective standards.