Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) Managing Director David Anderson has admitted that a comment claiming Australia was a “racist country” by a senior journalist was a mistake.
Ms. Tingle also allegedly accused Opposition Leader Peter Dutton of inciting racial abuse against migrants seeking to buy or rent a property, pointing to his migration cut proposal—an idea also accepted by the Labor government.
During a budget estimate hearing on May 30, Mr. Anderson was questioned about the broadcaster’s stance on the issue.
The managing director admitted that Ms. Tingle’s comment was a “misstep.”
“Ms. Tingle has expressed regret at those comments–the way that they were summarised and truncated. And I agree with her that that was a mistake,” he said.
“I think it’s a misstep for those comments to be made the way that they were unqualified.
“Laura Tingle has done an excellent job on our platforms, but when speaking off the platform for any journalist to make statements that are not qualified by context and analysis, that becomes problematic in that you don’t apply the same rigour that you would otherwise on your own platform.”
At the same time, Mr. Anderson defended the journalist, saying she did not deserve the “ferocity and frankly vicious attacks” that the ABC observed in the past week.
The director also alleged that other media outlets used Ms. Tingle’s comments to spread “misinformation” about the broadcaster.
“So what happens is that with comments like that are then re-reported by other media organisations, you are dealing with misinformation that is hurtful to the ABC,” he said.
“I will say that some media organisations have really taken this and run with it. There is also social media trolling happening for our people as well. All of which is hurtful to both individuals and the ABC itself.”
When questioned by a Coalition senator about whether Ms. Tingle should leave the ABC due to the incident, Mr. Anderson said that would not be the case.
“I don’t believe that Laura Tingle should leave the ABC,” he said.
Green Senator Suggests ABC Blacklist News Corp Journalists
While other members of the Senate Committee raised concerns about the way ABC handled Ms. Tingle’s remarks, Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young criticised media giant News Corporation for allegedly taking advantage of the incident.“They [News Corp] are so obsessed with the ABC, and they send their cronies in here to attack journalist after journalist,” she said.
“Every time they go after you and your journalists, it’s to suit their business model.
“It’s not because they care about the integrity of your journalists, or the message that is being sent to the community, it’s because it suits their business model to destroy the ABC.”
The senator then suggested that the public broadcaster stop hosting News Corporation personalities and commentators on their programs.
“Blacklist them. They don’t contribute anything to this actual debate. They’re doing the bidding of their masters, and that’s it,” she said.
In response, Mr. Anderson said the ABC would not not “deplatform” other people, and make sure that it had a diversity of perspectives.
“It is important for the ABC to cover a perspective of views that are held in this country,” he said.
While the managing director acknowledged it was reasonable for the ABC to be held to a higher degree of scrutiny, he said that practice turned into vitriol against the broadcaster’s employees at some point.
“There is some behaviour out there that exists across commercial media. That includes News Corp that we see coming at us,” he said.
