Martin Ferguson (Batman, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Transport, Roads and Tourism) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I welcome the opportunity this evening to speak on the sensitive issue of freedom of the press. In doing so I would also like to acknowledge the work of Hannah Colville, who is a gap student from England doing some voluntary work in my office at the moment.

As we all appreciate, media reporting and representation is fundamentally an exercise of power. That is why freedom of the press is so important. It is also why it carries great responsibility. In the lead-up to this year’s election, I think this is an important issue to remind ourselves of. Freedom of the press is about reporting on issues to the advantage of the public at large against vested interests. I remind the House that one of the best essays on this subject occurs in the form of George Orwell’s preface to Animal Farm. I am going to quote selectively from it because it is as true today as it was in the 1940s. He said:

At any given moment there is an orthodoxy, a body of ideas which it is assumed that all right-thinking people will accept without question. It is not exactly forbidden to say this, that or the other, but it is ‘not done’ to say it, just as in mid-Victorian times it was ‘not done’ to mention trousers in the presence of a lady. Anyone who challenges the prevailing orthodoxy finds himself silenced with surprising effectiveness. A genuinely unfashionable opinion is almost never given a fair hearing, either in the popular press or in the highbrow periodicals.

He went on to say:

If liberty means anything at all it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear. The common people still vaguely subscribe to that doctrine and act on it ... it is the liberals who fear liberty and the intellectuals who want to do dirt on the intellect.

I think of a number of issues at the moment that are exceptionally important that I have dealt with in my portfolios during this parliament and that are in danger of falling into this category, including the sensitive issues of forest conservation and climate change.

Not only do we live in a time when there is intolerance of unpopular arguments, but sensationalism and the misuse of information or visual footage is also used often to support a particular view. One example that springs to mind was the misuse of footage supplied by Doctors for Forests to the ABC for use in a news story about tax cuts for timber plantations. The report included statements about the poisoning of native animals, and the footage depicted a dead animal. It did not report that it had been taken out of the fridge and used on a number of occasions previously.

This sensationalist approach to news does a disservice to a public which relies on the popular media—TV, radio, newspapers and, increasingly, the World Wide Web—for information about important political issues. This is the easy way out: an appeal to the lowest common denominator rather than an effort to lift the standard of debate in this country and bring the community along with it.

Another manifestation of this problem is the so-called tabloid focus on ‘human interest’ stories that are either controversial or tragic, or both, and will evoke an emotional response from the public. The more outlandish or distressing the story, the more coverage it receives. Personal tragedies are transformed into media events despite the distress of those concerned and despite the fact that in most cases they do not have any direct impact on readers’ lives, the advancement of society, public policy or accountability. One of the most read stories in the Age in the last couple of days had the headline ‘Shopping trolley prank breaks woman’s neck’—undoubtedly a tragedy for the family involved but not a vital news story.

Media sensationalism can exacerbate delicate situations, deepen personal tragedy and entrench dangerous myths as reality. Instead, what we need is journalism that elevates the standard of debate in the community and challenges popular orthodoxies. In the lead-up to the election, when Australians will go to the polls to perform the very important task of selecting their national government for the next three years, I look forward hopefully—and this would be a change from the events of more recent times—to investigative journalism that gets to the heart of major issues and presents all sides so that George Orwell’s ‘common people’ can make up their own minds and act on their decision.

The media in recent times have been running a campaign about the government adhering to the issues of freedom of information. I also challenge the media this evening to have a look at themselves in the mirror about their own performance with respect to sensationalism and political correctness on some of the issues they have chosen to report on on an ongoing basis, which I do not think have been correct or to the advantage of the Australian community.

I also acknowledge the retirement of Senator Calvert as the President of the Senate and welcome a Ferguson to the President’s role in the Senate—a very good member of the Australian parliamentary Scottish association. I congratulate him on his elevation to this very important position in the other house, even though he is on the other side of the chamber.