Time for disclosure was at the beginning

IT is beyond self-evident that Margaret Simons should have disclosed that she recommended Denis Muller to work on the recent media inquiry.

She should have done so in her submission, when she gave evidence, and certainly when she praised the "weighty and scholarly" work of the inquiry (including by the man she recommended) in a comment piece.

Simons has forged an academic career criticising (a lack of) disclosure standards by others, yet when she fails to make a rather obvious disclosure, and calls reporting of the fact a "non-story", we are supposed to simply accept her lack of contrition.

Surely if there was ever a time to be overly cautious when meeting disclosure standards it's when a journalism professor fronts a self-proclaimed independent media inquiry.

The question anyone evaluating Simons's evidence to (and commentary on) the media inquiry needs to ask themselves is this: could her high praise for the work done by the inquiry - and her criticism of media commentary for attacking it - be viewed differently if one knew she had recommended the personnel involved in the inquiry and sought the opportunity for her journalism centre to play a research role in it?

The answer is yes, which is perhaps a (very poor) reason for not providing the disclosure.

Another would be that Simons simply forgot to do so, which carries the unedifying virtue of sloppiness outranking deceit as the explanation.

Either way, refusing to acknowledge the error is stubbornness on steroids, something I for one would like to think academics can rise above.

Despite Simons's refusal to admit her error when quizzed by The Australian yesterday, she quietly noted on her blog that "in the interests of total transparency" all correspondence has now been published. It's just a shame she didn't provide such a disclosure when the time was right.

As for the media ethicist Muller, he doesn't think his close colleague and supporter Simons has done anything wrong, making the point on her centre's website, no less. Of yesterday's coverage in The Australian, he wrote: "If The Australian was a flesh-and-blood person, you'd think it was off its medication."

A surprisingly politically incorrect turn of phrase for an ethicist.

Oh, and please note my disclosures topping and tailing this piece. And just to cover all the bases, to the best of my knowledge I have never so much as met Simons or Muller, and I don't recall having provided any commentary (critical or complimentary) on the media inquiry.

Peter van Onselen is the foundation professor of journalism at the University of Western Australia