The Australian made the most of being at the centre of the murder conviction of Chris Dawson for killing his wife, Lynette, publishing no fewer than six broadsheet pages after the verdict.
Chief reporter Hedley Thomas created The Teacher’s Pet podcast, which reignited interest in the cold case, and he took centre stage alongside Lyn’s family on the steps of the New South Wales supreme court.
While Thomas was modest about his role when he took to breakfast TV the next day, editorial director Claire Harvey was in no doubt The Teacher’s Pet was the key to the 40-year-old case: “It was the podcast that flashed around the world and brought down a killer,” she said.
It was a big moment for the paper, but if the Australian’s editor-in-chief, Christopher Dore, keeps handing out redundancies at the rate he has done in recent weeks, a newspaper already cut to the bone will have hardly anyone but Thomas left to fill its pages.
We told you recently about the departure of sport editor Wally Mason, business columnist Richard Gluyas, Strewth columnist Alice Workman and unofficial transgender issues correspondent Bernard Lane. The editor of the Weekend Australian Magazine, Christine Middap, is stepping down to take up a writing role.
This week there was a new wave of very senior departures which sent shock waves through the thinning ranks of the national daily. Longtime northern correspondent and Darwin bureau chief Amos Aikman is out, along with fashion editor Glynis Traill-Nash, national food writer John Lethlean and one of Australia’s most experienced technology reporters Chris Griffith.
Cathy Osmond, the deputy editor and lifestyle editor of the Weekend Australian Magazine has taken a redundancy after decades of holding senior editing roles across the Australian and the Courier Mail, leaving the magazine without an editor or deputy editor.
Some personal news: after 23 years with News Corp, more than 15,000 articles, a blog, a vlog, a podcast, and one resplendent TikTok video, I'll be leaving the outlet today. I've had a good run, I'm proud of my work, and I'm grateful for it. 🧵 pic.twitter.com/Nang1ecGN1
— Jen Dudley-Nicholson (@jendudley) September 2, 2022
There are suggestions among senior figures at News Corp that the toll was as high as 30, but Dore did not answer a request for comment. The Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance told Weekly Beast the Oz informed it of only five redundancies from the masthead, as part of 15 across the group. On Friday another senior tech writer, Jen Dudley-Nicholson, announced she was leaving news.com.au after 23 years.
Guilt trip
It wouldn’t be a big day for the media without a few bloopers as journalists rushed to report on the long, complex, unfolding verdict from Justice Ian Harrison. The social media teams for the Australian and Ten News sent out errant posts saying Dawson was “not guilty”, before quickly deleting.
And one TV news reporter, who was not in court for the verdict, confused Chris Dawson with his identical twin, Paul, as she jostled with the media pack for a comment outside the court. With Chris in handcuffs and off to jail, his brothers, Paul and Peter, were the centre of attention.
“Chris, you’re going to Silverwater. Do you have anything to say?’ she asked.
“I’m Paul, you idiot,” Paul said.
Nine’s strike-proofing
It takes a special skill to offend all your own journalists at Nine mastheads and everyone at news wire AAP, but that is what the managing director of publishing at Nine, James Chessell, did at a trade conference this week.
Chessell was on stage at the Mumbrella Publish Conference when he was asked about ongoing industrial relations tension with newspaper staff who want a 6% pay rise to keep up with inflation.
“We pay our journos better than anyone else in Australia,” Chessell said. “I’m pretty confident that we will close that gap and the tone of the negotiation so far has been pretty constructive.”
So far so good. But then he talked about how Nine signed a six-month trial with AAP in May, two years after Nine and the other major shareholder News Corp pulled out and the newswire service almost collapsed.
Chessell said the old model was a “complete imbalance” and not a “sustainable situation”.
“Under the new model, where AAP news wire is basically a government-funded model with a bit of commercial revenue on the side, I think that’s more sustainable,” Chessell said. “What do we get from it? I’m not going to lie, it gives us cover when there’s industrial action.”
James Chessell: “Under the new model, where @AAPNewswire is basically a government funded model with a bit of commercial revenue on the side, I think that’s more sustainable. What do we [Nine] get from it? I’m not going to lie, it gives us cover when there’s industrial action”
— Simon Crerar (@simoncrerar) August 31, 2022
While there was a suspicion in the industry that Nine may have been motivated to subscribe to AAP to cover the mastheads in the event of a strike, no one expected management to say it aloud.
Chessell is wrong about AAP being “basically” government-funded. Its commercial revenue, along with a slowly growing philanthropy business, far outstrips government funding, sources say.
Puzzling prose
A digital journalist at the Daily Telegraph, Sarah Buckley, made a splash on social media this week with an opinion piece “Nothing stings like a bee except a Leftist”. But it was for all the wrong reasons, namely, that no one could work out what she was getting at. Some even wondered if it was written by AI.
i'm not exaggerating, this article is legitimately the most unintelligible piece of writing i've ever seen in a mainstream publication.
— cammyboo AO (@cameronwilson) August 31, 2022
I encourage you to try make way your way through it: https://t.co/VoobVoqD80 https://t.co/CDMNVK8S6g
A few of the most puzzling paragraphs: “Funnily enough, that same culture indoctrinates social mores the Howard government helped posture. Indeed, it was gun control under his guise whereby removing guns after Port Arthur was Leftists’ most distinguishable political tool from far-rights in America as of recent times.
“The same holiday to New York where Australian Leftists’ were all the more happy to complain about having holidayed, tipped their workers 10 per cent of the bill plus GST – Australians have had only GST, also introduced by the Coalition.
“When I’m in a pub finding my modern life not all too dissimilar from Parliament House, therein lies the question – At what point must you choose morality over winning? For, if you argue with a Leftist, you are simply arguing with a child.”
It’s not clear whether the piece went through the opinion section or subeditors before it was published.
We asked Buckley what she meant but she didn’t get back to us by deadline.
ABC’s new arrivals
The communications minister, Michelle Rowland, has made good on her promise to “revisit” the makeup of the ABC board nominations panel which had several vacancies when Labor took office. “The reason for the nomination panel was to ensure that there was this extra layer of transparency and I think whatever actions we take in future as a government will be mindful of those principles,” Rowland told Weekly Beast in July.
Under the Coalition government, appointments to the ABC board were regularly “captain’s picks” and recommendations from the panel were ignored. The panel itself had been stacked with political appointments including ABC critics Janet Albrechtsen and Neil Brown.
The secretary of the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, Prof Glyn Davis, has appointed new members to the nominations panel – Dr Kirstin Ferguson, Catherine Liddle, and Prof Derek Wilding – who all have media backgrounds.
A former member of the board, Ferguson is an experienced company director and author. Liddle, an Arrernte/Luritja woman from central Australia, is the chief executive of National Voice for Our Children and has held roles at both public broadcasters. Wilding has worked at the Australian Press Council and the Australian Communications and Media Authority and is chair of the Public Interest Journalism Initiative expert research panel, and co-director of the centre for media transition at the University of Technology Sydney.
Parramatta grumblings
Staff at ABC Radio in Sydney were shocked to receive an email on Thursday announcing their manager, Andrew Clark, had suddenly quit. Some wondered if Clark was another victim of the move to Parramatta, after he had to take the brunt of complaints from unhappy ABC Radio staff. Local radio and Radio National have been targeted to move, while current affairs TV shows 7.30 and Four Corners have not.
“Andrew is moving on to work in recruitment for the music industry,” is all staff were told.
Clark was only appointed to the role of Local Manager for ABC Radio Sydney in December, joining Auntie from SBS News, where he was an executive producer.
“Have we broken him already?” asked one ABC presenter. Clark told Weekly Beast he enjoyed his time working with the ABC Sydney team but wanted to “deepen his commitment to 2MBS where he’s a director and presenter on the classical music station”.
Mate date
Sky News Australia host Paul Murray said “I’m proud of my mate”, when it was clear Scott Morrison had lost the election on that Saturday night in May.
On Monday night Morrison’s best mate in the media will host the former PM’s first television interview since his election defeat. Murray spent the day with the member for Cook on Thursday.
The love-in screens on Paul Murray Live at 8pm.
