Today, comparing The Advertiser‘s editorials on broken promises, Collinswood under threat, protecting journalists’ sources, a plum media contract, and much more.
Compare and contrast
The Murdoch media has this week had its way, with the Abbott Government breaking its clear pre-election promise not to cut the ABC and SBS.
It’s been a nakedly self-interested campaign by News Corporation. Put simply, it wants the ABC out of the digital realm which it sees as its commercial future.
There is deep irony in News Corp’s attacks on the alleged bias of the ABC, given its own gargantuan prejudices on display this week.
Want evidence? Look no further than The Advertiser‘s editorial on the ABC cuts this week, and compare it to the Tiser‘s editorial of October 13, 2011.
The 2011 editorial came the day after the Gillard Government managed to get its carbon tax legislation through the Lower House, despite Julia Gillard’s pre-election promise not to do so.
On that day, the Tiser thundered that the “so-called ‘representatives’ ignored the will of the people, and breached their own solemn words uttered in the lead-up to the election, to support a carbon tax they had expressly ruled out”.
The “bare-faced reversal” was “a low blow for democracy” that “sapped the Prime Minister’s credibility”.
Fast forward to Thursday, November 20, 2014, and the Abbott Government’s broken pre-election promise on the ABC doesn’t get a single mention in the Tiser‘s self-serving editorial.
The rigorous direct language of 2011, has been replaced by the passive voice – with Abbott’s broken promise airbrushed from history.
“There is some concern that the ABC has become too focused on competing with commercial media players,” the editorial whimpers.
What pathetic hypocrisy.
Read the 2011 editorial here – and this week’s here.
And for good measure, here’s Abbott’s election eve promise.
Collinswood’s shaky future
There’s plenty of anger at the ABC’s Collinswood studios about the Coalition’s broken promise on funding.
But there’s also plenty of angst about ABC management centralising power and functions in the corporation’s insulated head office in Sydney’s Ultimo.
With ABC managing director Mark Scott due to address staff on Monday, there’s a sense of inevitability about cuts to the Adelaide office, particularly the local version of 7.30 and the excellent TV production unit.
For South Australians, we are facing the loss of some serious TV and journalism talent – but there’s more.
Scott’s appearance before Senate Estimates last night also raised the prospect that the ABC might not retain its Collinswood HQ.
It’s no secret that local ABC management has been searching (mostly in vain) for more co-tenants to fill the building’s wide open spaces and bring in some rental dollars. A few years ago, it even courted Channel Nine, which eventually decided to move from its valuable, but impractical, North Adelaide digs to a more compact city space.
With 40 staff, and possibly more, set to get marching orders from Collinswood on Monday, can the corporation justify keeping the building?
Plenty of property developers would see the mid-rise building as a good prospect for conversion to an apartment block, similar to the transformation of the old transport department building, just across the road in Walkerville.
Who’s protecting whom?
Last week’s Press Club Awards were notable for many things, but particularly some telling comments from the winner of the big award of the night.
Veteran News Corp reporter Nigel Hunt – not one for overblown statements – collected the Gold Award and told the gathering that journalism in South Australia had become much more difficult over the past 12 months.
In fact, he said, investigative work that once took a few hours now took days, due to the need to gather material face-to-face.
Hunt said journalists now needed to think three or four steps in advance.
What did he mean?
It’s an open secret among journalists that the work of the ICAC is interfering seriously with the freedom of the press – a problem noted by this media outlet earlier this year.
We can’t tell you exactly why we’re concerned, because this would risk breaching the secrecy provisions of the ICAC Act, among other issues.
Suffice to say that journalists across Adelaide are worried that their investigative leg-work is vulnerable to covert observation and that their contacts may come under undue scrutiny.
How is this acceptable in a democracy?
The situation puts into context the campaign by some media organisations for so-called “shield laws” to provide legal protection for journalists who refuse to reveal their sources.
The central question for journalists is not how to protect our own hides but, as Hunt alluded to, how to protect our sources. Without them, we’re reduced to PR consultants.
Master ad contract up for grabs
One of the biggest prizes in South Australian advertising is up for grabs, with the State Government seeking requests for proposals to manage its master media agency services.
The contract, held by MEC, covers media planning, placement and buying for all of the State Government’s advertising.
The new contract will begin on July 1, 2015, for three years, with the option of a two-year extension.
According to media and marketing website Mumbrella, the contract managed a media spend of more than $20 million in the 12 months to October.
Submissions close on Christmas Eve.
Congratulations!
Excellent news today for South Australian media couple Nick and Jessica Harmsen.
Nick, the ABC’s state political reporter, and Jessica, ABC TV’s newsreader, welcomed a baby girl into the world yesterday – Amelia Penelope.
Green shoots
It’s a tough market for journalism graduates trying to break into the industry.
There was a time when The Advertiser would take at least enough cadets to fill a basketball team at the end of each year. With about 200 staff sacked in recent years, those days are certainly over.
However, in some rare good news the Tiser is again looking for cadets.
Details here.
More new faces for TT
Seven’s Today Tonight has added some more new faces to its team, with Pippa Bradshaw and Annelise Nielsen coming on board recently.
Bradshaw joined Today Tonight from regional news, while Nielsen joined TT this week from Hobart.
Top of the class
At the suggestion of a reader, Media Week will not only highlight dodgy performances but also excellent work in the media each week.
There’s been some solid local work this week, including FIVEaa’s Leon Byner putting public-sector minister Susan Close under an intense flame over IT failures at Service SA.
However, in honour of the beleaguered national broadcaster, we’ll give this week’s bouquet to ABC-TV’s Four Corners program for its heartbreaking, beautifully-judged and meticulously detailed report on transgendered children.
You can watch it here.
Naughty corner
This week’s naughty corner is also brought to you by the ABC.
Before most listeners were awake on Thursday, 891 breakfast presenter Matt Abraham teed off in ferocious fashion at News Corp gossip columnist Matt Gilbertson (unfortunately no audio is available to Media Week so I’ll have to paraphrase …).
Gilbertson had attended the opening of the Costco bulk goods store and, in an attempt to channel the late American comedian Joan Rivers, he peppered his copy with “old people” jokes. He compared the shoppers to the cast of the film Cocoon, and there were the inevitable references to incontinence and Zimmer Frames.
Abraham was more than peeved, noting it was no wonder the Tiser was losing circulation if it treated older readers with such contempt (along the way, he described the Tiser‘s older-skewed section “Boomer” as “dreadful”).
Apart from the octogenarian jokes, Gilbertson also offered this: “You know what they say: it’s a good night in Kilburn if you don’t wake up with stab wounds.”
Read the article here.
Media Week will appear in InDaily every Friday.
