Media
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RANALD MACDONALD. A wonderfully ‘Sydney-style’ rally was held on Sunday to galvanise support for the ABC
It was emotional, noisy, sweaty, energetic and organised chaos, as 1000 public broadcasting enthusiasts scrambled and fought their way into the 400 seat NSW Teachers Federation auditorium in Surry Hills. Continue reading »
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PATRICIA EDGAR. The ABC, Facebook and the Meaning of Trust
Trust is an interesting concept. It takes time to develop trust which results from a broad experience of something (or someone) which demonstrates consistent, reliable behavior with integrity, ability, and surety; it involves confident expectation. But trust can be lost irretrievably, quite quickly. Trust allows for mistakes if they are dealt with openly and honestly. Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. The dumbed- down tax ‘debate’ and the Canberra Press Gallery.
In the ‘debate’ over tax and the attacks on Bill Shorten, not one member of the Canberra Press Gallery could be bothered to explain to us that with dividend imputation the difference between a 25% and a 27% tax rate for a small company is infinitesimal. Continue reading »
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DUNCAN GRAHAM. Our failing media again-ignoring an election next door.
‘The World’ is a nightly news show on Australia Plus, our overseas TV showcase transmitted to 44 countries in Asia and the Pacific. The one-hour programme pulls together the day’s global issues, often adding lengthy interviews dissecting international developments. Continue reading »
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PATRICIA EDGAR. The Circus that has been Government Policy on the ABC for Forty Years
The ABC has been an extraordinarily resilient organisation. It has withstood management and Board upheavals, survived remorseless budget cuts and harassment. But the current attacks on staff and on its role are as overt and vicious as they have ever been. Many of those who were imbued with ABC values have died or moved on. Continue reading »
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DENNIS ALTMAN. Australia’s dangerous obsession with the Anglosphere
Australia’s cultural obsession with the US and the UK has real impacts on our politics. Continue reading »
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TONY SMITH. Under siege – the ABC, the Coalition and News Ltd.
When the Liberal Party Council endorsed a motion that sought to make privatisation of the ABC party policy, it laid bare several realities about Australian politics and media. The most obvious is that the ABC is under siege by the Liberals and Rupert Murdoch’s News Ltd. Continue reading »
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LAURIE PATTON. Is Telstra simply unmanageable right now?
What happens when you take a dysfunctional government corporation, privatise it, and then allow it to pretty much do as it likes? The answer to that question is at the heart of what is no doubt keeping Andrew Penn awake at night. Continue reading »
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PETER MANNING. Liberals on another planet
It disturbs me a great deal that it was the Federal Council of the Liberal Party that called by a large margin for the privatisation of the ABC. Not the rambo Young Liberals. Not a local branch in Sydney’s southern Shire or Northern Beaches. Not a state Branch gone troppo. But the full Federal Council. Continue reading »
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ALLAN PATIENCE: Our ABC!
Grimly ideological neoliberals in the ranks of the young fogies at the Liberal Party’s recent federal council sponsored a motion to privatise the ABC. In an astonishing display of shooting themselves in the foot, the old fogies present (including Ministers Mitch Fifield and Julie Bishop) glumly and dumbly let the motion pass, thereby handing the Continue reading »
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CAROL GLATZ. Dictatorships begin with taking over media, warns pope
Individuals are tempted to destroy by spreading scandalous news, Pope Francis said during Mass. Media outlets are also put in the hands of unscrupulous people. Continue reading »
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LAURIE PATTON. You can’t privatise an organisation that doesn’t make a profit!
The ABC earns around $100 million a year from its commercial activities (mainly ABC shops). Its annual operating budget is more than a billion dollars. Continue reading »
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MICHAEL PASCOE. Liberals’ lurch to the right is straight out of Trump playbook
“What federal council meeting? Oh, that federal council meeting – privatising the ABC, following Trump on moving our embassy to Jerusalem? No, nothing to see here. Move along.” Continue reading »
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PAUL COLLINS. No longer eight cents a day.
For a lumbering, slow-moving, accident prone government, the Liberals moved like Speedy Gonzales to reassure us that they wouldn’t “privatize” or “sell” the ABC as recommended by a Young Liberal motion at the recent Liberal federal council meeting. Energy minister Josh Frydenberg rushed in to assure us that “the ABC is an iconic national institution, Continue reading »
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RANALD MACDONALD. The threat to public broadcasting in this country becomes more menacing by the day.
Those who say that the ABC will be around for years to come have their heads truly in a world of denial. On top of the Government’s huge cuts to funding, with 1000 less employed today than four years ago, continual harassment and criticism, now the Federal Liberal Council meeting in Sydney (June 16) has, Continue reading »
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JOHN MOLONY. A review of Race Mathews, Of Labour and Liberty: Distributism in Victoria 1891–1966
Many years ago, I tried to review Ronald Knox’s lifelong study of the numerous minor sects or branches of post-Reformation Christianity. He named it Enthusiasm. Despite my own enthusiasm for the treasures amassed in the book, I was unable to write a review. The riches were so abundant and differed so much that ten reviews Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE The media are finding Chinese under most rocks.
The campaign run by some of our security agencies and people close to them about the alleged Chinese threat is getting great support from some journalists. The latest is Andrew Greene, the security and defence reporter at the ABC who breathtakingly reported last week that ‘A Chinese vessel, believed to be a spy ship, docked Continue reading »
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LAURIE PATTON. Community tv – needed now more than ever.
Last week the Government announced a further two year extension on its deadline for community television stations to vacate their free-to-air spectrum. The death knell first rang back in September 2014 when then communications minister Malcolm Turnbull announced that all CTV licences would end in December 2015. Since then the sector has limped on courtesy Continue reading »
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WAYNE SWAN. Foreign influence and foreign donations in Australia.
The debate over foreign influence in our domestic politics and policymaking is an important one for our country – too important for political point-scoring and manipulation by vested interests and political vendettas. Continue reading »
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DAMIEN CAVE. Blurred lines between journalists and what we cover.
As soon as I made eye contact with the smiling woman in the Doctors Without Borders T-shirt on a busy Sydney street, I knew I’d be asked for money or a signature. And I knew I’d say no. “I’m a foreign correspondent for The New York Times,” I told her. “I can’t really help because Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE Our security agencies are not accountable.
The performance and integrity of our security services is a serious national problem. These are particular problems for agencies which operate in secret and with few public checks. We have seen that they are prepared to upstage ministers and undermine governments on key public issues like relations with China at the moment. There is no Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. Who is in charge of Australia’s relations with China? The Australian Prime Minister or ASIO?
ASIO is on a roll in co-ordinating the attack on China and its alleged covert operations in Australia. Only last Friday we learnt that super patriot Andrew Hastie, formerly an officer in SAS and currently Chair of the Parliamentary Joint Committee on Intelligence and Security, cleared his parliamentary speech with ASIO but not his own Continue reading »
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PETER MANNING. Public trust and the ABC, a landmine for Turnbull.
It’s a long-time ago now but in the early 1990’s, just after I’d finished my stint as head of ABC TV News and Current Affairs (and having a blue with first Bob Hawke and then David Hill over ABC TV coverage of the first Iraq war), I took over as General Manager of the ABC’s Continue reading »
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LAURIE PATTON. Consultation group to help reshape Internet domain names management.
With three months to develop new processes to redress historical weaknesses the company managing Australia’s Internet domain names has created a broad-based consultative group to guide the process. Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. The scourge of lobbyists.
There are many key public issues that we must address such as climate change, growing inequality, tax avoidance, budget repair, an ageing population, lifting our productivity and our treatment of asylum seekers. But our capacity to address these and other important issues is becoming very difficult because of vested interests with their lobbying power to influence Continue reading »
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GOOD READING AND LISTENING FOR THE WEEKEND …
A sense of complacency, a lack of intellectual curiosity, a failure to think about the bigger picture, a pursuit of consensus lessening constructive criticism. These are some of the findings in the Australian Prudential Regulatory Agency report into the Commonwealth Bank. It concludes that “CBA’s continued financial success dulled the senses of the institution”. Its Continue reading »
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RANALD MACDONALD. ABC cuts – the gloves are off.
The Coalition’s latest budget aimed at ensuring the voters return it to the government benches has dropped any pretence of supporting a vibrant, independent and properly funded ABC. Continue reading »
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LAURIE PATTON. What’s going on at auDA? The battle over Internet domain names.
Anyone who uses an Internet domain name – which means most Australian companies, educational institutions, government departments and not-for-profits – should know what’s currently happening with the domain names registration process. Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. The international press at Panmunjom for the KIm-Moon Summit were much more impressed than the Australian press.
I was struck by the response, amazement and obvious excitement of the international press at Panmunjom, near Seoul last Friday. See link. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dw8mROuQs44 But the media interest in Australia seemed remarkably low key and almost disinterested. At least our media was not as sulky and cynical as the Japanese media, Continue reading »
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GOOD READING AND LISTENING FOR THE WEEKEND …
The ABC’s Spirit of Things has woven together several ANZAC stories, including the revelation that the puggaree on our slouch hat is a variant of the Sikhs’ turban. The program starts with presenter Noel Debien interviewing Marist Brother John Lutterll, who has written a biography of an Australian who served in the Gallipoli campaign as Continue reading »
