David Coleman (Banks, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

It is great to be able to speak on this motion regarding the ABC and SBS and to follow on from some of the very wide-ranging debates that we have seen over the last half hour or so. The motion can be boiled down to two issues. One issue is whether the government should direct the ABC on how to manage editorial content. The answer to that is, of course, no. The second issue is whether the government should ensure that the taxpayers get good value out of what the ABC does, and the answer to that is absolutely yes. It is entirely consistent with support for the ABC to say that the ABC should be required to do a good job with the substantial taxpayer funds it has. It would be an abrogation of responsibility if a government did not make sure that the ABC was being operated as efficiently as it could be.

When it comes to editorial content, the ABC has an obligation to provide accurate and impartial commentary in its news and current affairs. It is obviously a matter for the board to satisfy itself that that is what the ABC is in fact doing, and it is good to see those remarks from the chairman in recent times regarding the processes that he will be putting in place. I have served on the boards of a number of media organisations and if I were on the board of the ABC I would certainly want to make sure that it was appropriately meeting its requirement to provide accurate and impartial reporting. A simple way of doing that—as the chairman has put in place—is to have regular external reviews or a subcommittee of the board, but it does seem to me that it is incumbent upon the board to satisfy itself on that question. The only way the board can satisfy itself on that question is if it asks the question and reviews the issue on a regular basis, because accuracy and impartiality are important.

It is also entirely appropriate that, from time to time, the editorial policies of the ABC are criticised. There would not be a person in this chamber who agrees with absolutely everything the ABC says. Just as the ABC would fight for its independence and for its capacity to be able to speak freely, so should each of us be able to speak freely on matters related to the ABC. I know there have been many ABC reports that I certainly have not agreed with in their editorial tone, and no doubt that occurs right across the board.

It is also important that the ABC is efficient. The ABC is not a hermetically sealed organisation that cannot ever be questioned and cannot ever be subject to change. We all have to change because if we do not move forward then, by definition, we are going backwards. The ABC should look at its efficiency, and the sorts of things that the current review is looking at are very important. These are issues like how much the ABC spends on programming as a percentage of its total expenditure, and you want that number to be as high as possible; how the ABC manages its broadcast operations from an engineering perspective and whether they are as efficient as they could be in an environment where the technology around broadcasting and video file compression is changing pretty much by the week; and whether the cooperation across the different levels of the ABC is as integrated as it could be between broadcast, radio and digital. These are the sorts of questions that a sensible review would look at.

I am certainly heartened by the fact that Peter Lewis, former CFO of Seven—who, coincidentally or not, was CFO at Seven at a time when it was very successful in the 2000s—is leading that review, and I am sure that that review will look into these issues related to the ABC's efficiency. I served with Mr Lewis on the board of Sky News, and always found him to be a very intelligent and conscientious gentleman, and I am sure he will do a great job with this upcoming review.

Clearly editorial policy is a matter for the ABC—it is not appropriate for the government to dictate and editorial position, and it is not intending to do so. But the government will fight hard, as it should, to ensure that the ABC operates efficiently. And that is precisely what we are doing.

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