The ABC takes a stand but will activists get the message?

The real problem of the ABC’s lack of political diversity has little to do with how its journalists behave on Twitter.

Charlie Pickering hosts the ABC TV series The Weekly. Picture: Supplied

It’s just over a week since ABC managing director and editor-in-chief David Anderson issued an all-staff email instructing recipients that they should refrain from bringing the public broadcaster into “disrepute”.

This occurred in the wake of Four Corners’ executive producer Sally Neighbour deleting two tweets comparing the (alleged) life of James Packer and Melbourne personality Eddie McGuire. Last October, Anderson let his displeasure be known that 7.30 chief political correspondent Laura Tingle had sent out a late-hour tweet referring to the Morrison government’s “ideological bastardry”. Scott Morrison has not appeared on 7.30 since then.

In a sense, this directive to be circumspect in tweeting is unfortunate. ABC management denies the description of the taxpayer-funded broadcaster as a conservative-free-zone — without one conservative presenter, producer or editor on any of its prominent television, radio or online outlets. But it declines to name anyone on a mainstream ABC outlet who would fit the term conservative, preferring to focus on a couple of low-rating programs during non-prime viewing and listening times.

Anderson’s aim is that ABC staff should not “mix the professional and the personal in ways likely to bring the ABC into disrepute”. But this will have the (perhaps) unintended consequence of censoring what ABC staff really believe — and will facilitate management’s denial that the ABC is a conservative-free zone. For example, Tingle and Neighbour are on the left — along with so many of their high-profile colleagues. From now on they won’t be waging ideological war in the Twittersphere if they adhere to Anderson’s directive.

It is a matter of record that Anderson has not threatened to discipline any conservatives for breaking the ABC’s social media policy. Not surprising, really, since there are no high-profile staff who fit the description.

The ABC’s Laura Tingle, with 7.30 host Leigh Sale.

The real problem of the ABC’s lack of political diversity has little to do with Twitter. The overwhelming majority of Australians do not engage in political debate, or sledging, on social media — which is a hangout for the ideological left. The essential issue turns on what passes for comment on the ABC’s mainstream programs.

Take the influential ABC Radio National Breakfast program on Wednesday, for example. Discussing the serious allegation that a female Coalition staff member was raped in Parliament House two years ago, presenter Fran Kelly defended herself against what she said was the protests of listeners (no number was given) that she had defended the Prime Minister’s handling of the issue.

Kelly declared: “Let me be clear, I’m not defending the Prime Minister on this at all. I can’t understand why a crime could be committed in a ministerial office and it has not been reported immediately to the authorities and to the highest level of authority in the government, which is the Prime Minister. It’s a great miscalculation and a really obviously terrible handling of this alleged — of this allegation of rape …”

Now Kelly is funded by the taxpayer to be a presenter, not a commentator. She told journalist Tim Elliott in March 2012 that she “really is an activist”. But that’s not what ABC presenters are supposed to be.

In any event, there is no available evidence to support Kelly’s assertion that Morrison had been aware that an alleged crime had been committed in a Coalition government minister’s office or that he handled the issue terribly. No, that’s the voice of an activist who shows signs of hostility to the Coalition. That’s the essential problem with the ABC. It has oh-so-many green-left journalists who rail against various conservatives. But not one prominent conservative on a high-rating mainstream outlet.

What passes for comedy at the public broadcaster illustrates the point. 7.30 is presented as ABC TV’s principal current affairs program. It runs for only four nights a week, ending on Thursday. Every second week presenter Leigh Sales introduces a segment she describes as satire, performed by comedian Mark Humphries and co-written by Evan Williams. Just as well for it is rarely, if ever, funny.

Fortnight after fortnight, virtually without exception, the 7.30 house satirists sneer at the Liberal Party and Nationals. Some ABC viewers would probably regard the green-left in general and the Greens in particular as an occasion for satire. But not the Humphries-Williams duo whose “art” focuses on mocking conservatives. It is not at all clear why the ABC engages a satirist to appear on its leading current affairs program.

And there is The Weekly with Charlie Pickering, which airs on ABC TV each Wednesday. Pickering presents his show as a report on the news. But it’s not really that. And it’s not really funny. On February 12, for example, Pickering did a sketch titled Please Explain: Scotty and Paul. The reference was to Morrison and Sky News presenter Paul Murray. It was difficult to tell what the joke was — it appeared to focus on the Prime Minister’s use of analogies. Namely, references to his mother, optimism, football and so on.

The segment ended with the voiceover saying with reference to a footballer: “I don’t know who that (footballer) is but I guess he’s a bloody good bloke. Join the boys (Scotty and Paul) next week as they unpack cryptocurrency and why sheilas take so long in the bathroom.” How funny is that? There was more of the same on The Weekly this week.

Tim Davie, the newly appointed BBC director-general, moved against journalists running left-wing lines on Twitter well before Anderson did. He accused the BBC of promoting “a left-wing view of the world” and said the comedy shows on BBC radio and television were unfairly balanced against conservatives.

Davie has also told his journalists: “If you want to be an opinionated columnist or a partisan campaigner on social media then that is a valid choice, but you should not be working at the BBC.”

The ABC is essentially a staff-run collective. But at least Anderson is taking something of a stand against activist journalists whom he believes are bringing the organisation into disrepute. It remains to be seen whether the likes of Tingle, Neighbour, Kelly and Pickering will get the message.

Gerard Henderson is executive director of the Sydney Institute. His Media Watch Dog blog
can be found at www.theaustralian.com.au