Tag Archives: Fairfax

The Rules are Different if You’re News Corp…

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This week, documents were leaked to Crikey regarding the sales and earnings of News Corporation’s Australian arm, News Corp Australia. It turns out that News Corp’s earnings from papers, like The Australian fell quite a lot – about $27 million –  back in the 2012-13 financial year.

If you remember back in November, News Corp’s papers released the salaries of ABC presenters and staff. The ABC was justifiably annoyed, and it was pointed out that commercial presenters earn at least three times more as their ABC counterparts (You can read my post/rant about it here). So, you’d think that when something similar happened to News Corp this week, they might be justifiably annoyed about private, internal information being broadcast and get on with their lives.

But, no.

Crikey was threatened with legal action by News Corp for releasing the information and, in the end, agreed not to reveal anything else and destroy the documents they had (ABC News story here).

I am in no way condoning the release of private, internal documents relating to the finances of a company, regardless of the “it’s in the public interest” argument, but that isn’t the point of this post. My issue is that News Corp is more than happy to release leaked information about its rivals, but when these rivals do the same to them, they call the lawyers and threaten legal action. It’s massively hypocritical.

When the ABC salary figures were released by News Corp, the ABC’s Managing Director, Mark Scott, heavily criticised the organisation, and had some justifiably annoyed comments to make. News Corp should never have released the figures, which were private, internal documents that breached the privacy of not only the ABC but its employees. The ABC didn’t threaten legal action straight away, and in the end, they never did. Had they decided to call in the lawyers, News Corp would have been even more critical.

It seems different rules apply if you’re News Corp. They’re allowed release leaked, private information about their rivals and get away with it, while everyone else has to leave them alone. They are allowed to complain about and be critical of their rivals, like Fairfax and the ABC, but no one can be critical about them. They can tell the public that the ABC is biased to the left (progressive) side of politics, simply by misconstruing basic facts about the ABC.

There shouldn’t be a double standard in Australian media, dictated by one media outlet that thinks it is above all others. I would understand News Corp crying foul about Crikey’s revelation – had they not done something similar to the ABC last year. It shows that they can dish it out, but can’t take it: a massively hypocritical and incredibly dangerous position that makes it OK for News Corp to do what they want, no matter the cost.

The Week That Was – February 9 to February 15

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So, Griffith will remain in Labor hands after the by-election last week, despite a lower than expected voter turnout. Who can blame them though? People in that area have had to go and vote up to five times in the last three years.

Meanwhile, the Government has decided to hold a Royal Commission into construction union corruption after the ABC and Fairfax broke the story. Speaking of unions, Tony Abbott seems to like blaming them for problems. This week Toyota announced they would stop manufacturing cars in Australia by 2017. This means that there will be no more car manufacturing in Australia after 2017. He says that the unions are to blame because they were demanding about work conditions, despite the fact that Toyota’s isn’t blaming them at all.

Tony Abbott has also been using his “some businesses close, others open” and “some jobs finish and others begin” lines again. While that line wasn’t commented on in Australia, an Australian CNN journalist threw some excellent shade by commenting “No word yet on what those new jobs will be”. There are fears however, because if the number of new jobs created is less than the number of jobs lost, there could be a recession here in Australia, which we avoided thanks to Kevin Rudd’s Labor government in 2007.

SPC Ardmona has been thrown a $22 million lifeline by the Victorian Government in a deal with the parent company Coca Cola Amatil. They’ll upgrade the plant with the money and hopeful keep some workers there. I don’t know if the Victorian Government were always going to give some money anyway, but they had promised to match the $25 million that SPC asked the Federal Government for, had they helped. Another issue is Qantas, Australia’s national airline. They would also like some money and some ownership legislation change. They’re saying that because they are not Holden, and they mainly want a change in their foreign ownership guidelines, the government should really consider helping them, and that argument appears to have worked.

Moving on, the Close the Gap Report shows that while there have been some gains within the indigenous population, particularly in decreasing infant mortality and the rise in Year 12 attainment, there are still some major issues to deal with, such as life expectancy and unemployment. The national unemployment rate also rose this month, which was expected but there are disagreements over who or what is to blame.

On to international matters, the foreign minister Julie Bishop has been in Fiji with delegates from the Pacific Forum in the hopes that once free and fair elections are held in Fiji later this year, the nation can rejoin the forum. Bishop says that she hopes to increase to trade between Australia and Fiji. Of more concern however, is that when the Americans come to Indonesia in the next week, the Indonesian Foreign Minister has said he will be talking to them about Australia’s actions in Operation Sovereign Borders. Oh dear.

Tweet of the Week

Juanita Phillips, the weekday newsreader for ABC News NSW has got Twitter (and a new news set)

Faux Pas of the Week

A lesson in paying attention in Federal Parliament.  Nickolas Varvaris, a Liberal MP, appeared to be asleep during a division of the house and he ended up voting with Labor, because no-one told him what had happened. Oops.

What I’ve been Reading/Watching/Listening

A Valentine’s themed Dumb Ways to Die message (see the original here)

The ABC Elections Site – with two (maybe three) state elections and multiple by-elections this year, not to mention some recent redistributions, you need to have a look.

The Week That Was – January 26 to February 1

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So, this week began with controversy. The guy who runs one of Australia’s pro-monarchy groups thinks that a referendum on Indigenous recognition could lead to “violence in the streets” against those who do not support it. He’s been criticised for his comments because, really, I don’t think Australians would be that stupid as to get violent just because people don’t agree on a topic. If we were, there wouldn’t be many of us left, and no-one would want to be a politician.

The ABC and Fairfax revealed that there is corruption and criminality in the CFMEU (the construction union) and at some of Australia’s major building sites. Tony Abbott says he isn’t surprised, and says that if the Labor Party is serious about tackling corruption they will “stay out of the way”. Abbott used to be the minister that oversaw this kind of stuff, and there was a Royal Commission. He wants another now, but the unions don’t. They don’t see why the government can’t leave the investigating to the Australian Federal Police.

Tony Abbott had a go at the ABC too, not for the story they broke about the CFMEU and construction industry, though. You see, the Prime Minister seems to think that the ABC is “on everyone’s side but Australia’s”. Labor thinks that the government should leave the ABC alone. And in what seems like the worst timing possible, the next day Malcolm Turnbull announced an efficiency review into the ABC and SBS (which is partially taxpayer-funded). Turnbull appeared on the ABC and explained what the review was going to be about. You can see that here.

There has also been a bit of a change in the stories about how the asylum seekers got burnt. They’re still blaming the Australian Navy, but one now says that they were sprayed in the eyes with pepper spray and as he couldn’t see, he walked into the engine, burning his hands. Another says that asylum seekers were thrown onto the engine when they confronted the sailors. Meanwhile, Scott Morrison appeared in front of a Senate Committee, and answered some questions on Operation Sovereign Borders. He didn’t answer some of them because the people smugglers would have found out. But why any other nation would broadcast Australian Senate Committee sittings confounds me, given other nations don’t really seem to care about Australian politics, unless the leader changes,.

Also this week, Peter Cosgrove was named the next Governor-General of Australia. He still has to be approved by Parliament and the Queen, but most people seem pleased and Labor appears to like him.

Tweets of the Week

The ABC News and Current Affairs staff got a bit cheeky after the PM said they weren’t patriotic.

What I’ve been Reading/Watching/Listening

Opinion on the Coalition vs. ABC – Guardian Australia

Tracey Spicer at TEDxSouthBankWomen

Jonathan Holmes on Scott Morrison and the ABC – Sydney Morning Herald

Faux Pas of the Week

Julie Bishop is usually intelligent, but someone must not have checked that she knew what electorate she was in, because she kept calling Griffith (Kevin Rudd’s old seat, currently in a by-election campaign) “Griffin”. Oops. (it starts at about 0:35)

The Year that Was – 2013 Politics

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It’s been an interesting year in politics, and I thought I’d do it by the numbers.

Harry Potter references: 2

“Neither can live while the other survives” – Mark Simkin, said during a live cross to Parliament House explaining that whoever lost the leadership spill in June (it was Julia) was not going to stay in politics in the following election.

“It’s like in the Harry Potter novels….Dolores Umbridge is now in charge” – Tony Burke, made during a speech congratulating Bronwyn Bishop on her election into the Speaker’s chair.

ALP Spills: 3

#1: Courtesy of Simon Crean, the first spill of the year, in March, was essentially a non-spill, because Kevin didn’t put his hand up and Julia Gillard remained the PM.

#2: Julia Gillard got sick of the rumours and called a spill, with the loser leaving politics at the next election. Kevin Rudd won, and Julia kept her word.

#3: Post election, the ALP had a spill for leader, this time not only with caucus but also rank-and-file members of the ALP. In what was a slightly insane and complicated spill, Bill Shorten became Opposition leader.

Federal Elections: 1

Thank god there was only one of these – I think we would’ve gone mental if there were more. In short, Tony Abbott and the Coalition won. Now we’re get to wait for 3 years!

Backflips: 1

Artfully named the “Quadruple Gonski Backflip” by ABCNews23 (NOT 24) on Twitter, it charts the Coalitions position on the “Gonski Reforms” – reforms to the education system. First they didn’t like it, then they were ok with it and would carry it on, then after the election they said they were going to renegotiate. After getting into trouble from lots of parents, they said they would support it.

Threats of a Double Dissolution: 1

Tony Abbott began threatening this before he even won the election. He suggested that if the Carbon Tax was not repealed, he would ask for a double dissolution so he could try to control the Senate – although it appears that recently, someone has (maybe) told him it could backfire because he hasn’t made that threat in a while…

Ballot Recounts: 3

#1: Indi (VIC) – to double-check the numbers – Cathy McGowan, an independent, won the seat of Sophie Mirabella.

#2: Faifax (QLD) – again to double-check the numbers – Clive Palmer, billionaire mining magnate and dinosaur park owner, won the seat.

#3: West Australia – the Senate results were so close, there was a recount – which didn’t end too well (see below)

Magical appearances/vanishing of ballot papers: 2

Appearance: Due to a clerical error, a container/box of ballot papers in Indi were discovered to have 1000, not 100 papers inside, which help Cathy McGowan in Indi win the seat.

Vanishing: Somehow, somewhere, 1,300 Senate ballot papers in Western Australia vanished and were never seen again. It changed the result of the Senate and is possibly the subject of a High Court challenge.

I hope you all have a lovely new year.

The Aftermath

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In place of The Week That Was, I have an election aftermath special. All will be back to normal next week.

So, for those of you who watched DVDs on Saturday night to avoid the coverage, or just forgot, Tony Abbott has become Prime Minister. As of Sunday night, the Liberals have 86 seats, Labor has 57, one seat for the Greens, one Independent (Andrew Wilkie) and one Katter Party. Four seats are still in doubt, two of which could go to Palmer United Party.

Here is Kevin Rudd’s concession speech – it’s long, but he is being a good loser.

On the other hand, I bring you Tony Abbott’s acceptance speech, he’s somewhat less of a good winner, but then again, he’s not that kind of person.

Senate is being a little more difficult and the funky preferences mean that the Greens may not be holding the balance of power there anymore. That could belong to a bunch of small peculiar parties such as the Motoring Enthusiasts Party, the Sports Party and Nick Xenophon and John Madigan have their seats. Once again there are questions over whether we should have electoral reform given that there is such a strange mix of senators this election.

There were some interesting tidbits in the ABC News Special on Sunday night that required the 7:30 presenter Leigh Sales, and, at least in NSW, the ABC News weekday presenter Juanita Phillips to cover the news, as opposed to the weekend people. Not only that, but the ABC journalist out in the seat of Fairfax (where Clive Palmer could win) had placed himself right in front of the dinosaur at a golf course Clive Palmer owns – it started moving as the journo began his live cross, leading to a lot of laughs in my living room.