Writer
Quentin Dempster
Quentin Dempster AM is a journalist, broadcaster and author. He is a former ABC presenter, interviewer, producer and investigative reporter. He is a former chairman of the Walkley Foundation and former chair of the Walkley judging panel for the annual awards for excellence in Australian journalism. Quentin is also a regular contributor to Pearls and Irritations and other publications.
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PM’s anti-corruption commission is a picture of impotence (The New Daily, 14.12.18)
No public hearings? Prime Minister Scott Morrison’s proposed Commonwealth Integrity Commission is deeply flawed in its current conception under the authorship of Attorney-General Christian Porter and the Attorney-General’s department. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Mass media power plays and the death of Fairfax
The competition regulator ACCC has now green-lighted the death of Fairfax Media Ltd., the governance entity what has been a foundational influence on public interest journalism in Australia since 1831. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Google vs News Corp in Australian algorithm war
It’s Google versus News Corp Australia in a battle over the way algorithms can be controlled to drive internet search engine traffic. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. A short history of the ABC. Part 2.
The Senate will be enquiring into political interference at the ABC. Quentin Dempster provides useful historical background to that inquiry. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. A short history of the ABC. Part 1.
The Senate will be enquiring into political interference at the ABC.Quentin Dempster provide useful historical background to that inquiry. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. ABC: Frontrunners to replace Justin Milne emerge (the New Daily, 27.09.18)
The Morrison government is to appoint a new ABC chairman immediately as fallout continues over the sacking of managing director Michelle Guthrie. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Government moves ABC chair Justin Milne to the exit ramp (the NewDaily, 27.09.18)
The Scott Morrison government and the ABC board are moving to pressure ABC chairman Justin Milne to resign as soon as possible. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Was there a political motivation behind ABC’s Michelle Guthrie sacking?
The unexpected sacking of ABC managing director Michelle Guthrie has raised one big question, among the many. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. ‘Because it’s wreck-able’: Anger mounting at decision to end Fairfax.
The proposed end of Fairfax Media as an entity governing the editorial output of The Age, The Sydney Morning Herald, The Australian Financial Review and regional newspapers has provoked mounting anger by some of Australia’s most prominent journalists. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. The new coalition that is really governing Australia.
There’s a new coalition governing Australia. On Thursday it was personal tax cuts and the contentious elimination of the 37.5 per cent tax bracket from 2024. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Australia’s sledge hammer to crack foreign influence pedlars.
New laws to protect Australia’s democratic governance and economy are about to be determined, now with heightened fear about Chinese influence. Draft bills before federal parliament cover electoral funding, cybersecurity and espionage and a new enforceable regime of self-registration for transparency of foreign influence. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Positions vacant: NBN Co’s ‘death seat’.
After Mike Quigley and Bill Morrow, who’s next for NBN Co’s CEO ‘death seat’? It can be called an executive death seat because the NBN’s business plan to start recouping the cost of the Turnbull government’s mis handled $49billion multi-technology mix (MTM) rollout has been shredded. Continue reading »
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Emma Alberici’s now more critical tax cuts ‘analysis’ reposted by ABC
After a bitter dispute between ABC management and their star chief economics correspondent, Emma Alberici, the ABC today reposted her ‘analysis’ of the Turnbull government’s plan for big corporate tax cuts. Continue reading »
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Has the ABC buckled to PM Malcolm Turnbull by removing critical ‘analysis’ of the claimed benefits of corporate tax cuts?
The ABC’s chief economics correspondent Emma Alberici stands by her ‘analysis’. Significantly the ABC, through Ms Alberici’s editorial superiors Gaven Morris, the director of ABC News, and Alan Sunderland, director of editorial policies, do not.In a promoted article posted on February 14 after the broadcast of an ABC News item reporting that many Australian companies did Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Slack electoral regulations and the arrogance of power
Senator Pauline Hanson denies any impropriety. We are told there is nothing to see in the Liberal Party siphoning cash from their MPs’ taxpayer-funded electoral allowances purportedly to fund the party’s voter analysis entity Parakeelia Pty. Ltd. ALP Senator Sam Dastyari’s failure to disclose that a party donor had paid a personal invoice was nothing but Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Death and departure at the ABC
The death of ABC broadcaster Mark Colvin on Thursday, May 11th, came as we were preparing to farewell religious broadcaster John Cleary from the ABC after a 37 year career. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. With talk of war, what should Australia do?
As the United States Trump administration now confronts North Korea, there is talk of war. Also confronted, but more indirectly, is China itself with President Donald Trump’s declaration that the US would go it alone to disarm North Korea if China and President Xi Jinping did not help in that objective. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Wilful ignorance and the courage to explain
The role of committed journalists, whether in a functioning democracy like Australia, or a country under a kleptocracy, totalitarian or politburo governance, is to tell the public what is really going on. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Michelle Guthrie’s survival strategy for the ABC
ABC MD Michelle Guthrie’s survival strategy for the national broadcaster is to re-invest brutally extracted payroll savings into new “extraordinary” content. While encouraging staff to come up with exciting new creative ideas to use the $20m available immediately and then $50m a year in a content fund she says her flattened management restructure will deliver, Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. NBN – Are you one of the lucky ones in Turnbull’s two-speed society?
If Australia was a corporation, we, its shareholders, would be justified in terminating CEO Malcolm Turnbull’s employment contract forthwith. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Michelle Guthrie’s strategic plan for the ABC.
New ABC managing director Michelle Guthrie now faces a choice. She can simply manage the ABC’s government-decreed decline or reorganise its resources to make distinctive, original and quality content the institution’s strategic priority. The choice she (and the ABC board which appointed her) make will become apparent when the ABC publishes its updated corporate plan. Continue reading »
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Quentin Dempster. Countering Rupert Murdoch’s plan to destroy public broadcasting in Australia.
I regret to report there are forces at work in this country out to destroy public broadcasting… the ABC and SBS. But the fight to protect and enhance a more dynamic public broadcasting sector has just begun. Tomorrow in The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald, you will see a half page ad paid for Continue reading »
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Quentin Dempster. Rupert Murdoch destroys freedom of the press.
In a recent address to the Medico-Legal Society of NSW, Quentin Dempster has referred to the parlous state of journalism and the media and particularly the damage being caused by Rupert Murdoch and News Corp. It is a no-holds barred speech about the damage that Rupert Murdoch is doing. See link to the speech below. Continue reading »
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Quentin Dempster. Attacks on the ABC’s international broadcasting service.
Australian insularity and the strident xenophobia it generates is, I reckon, a significant drawback to our development as a responsive and engaged country in the Asia Pacific region. In this context it was immensely distressing to see the recent vandalising of this country’s international broadcasting services through Foreign Minister Julie Bishop’s unilateral decision to terminate Continue reading »
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Quentin Dempster. Submission to the Senate Select Committee.
S U B M I S S I O N Senate Select Committee into the Abbott Government’s Budget Cuts on Friday 12 December 2014 Quentin Dempster – appearing as a private individual VANDALISING THE ABC Following is a list of impacts which I have assembled from available sources. I can add to it as more Continue reading »
