Jim Lloyd (Robertson, Liberal Party, Minister for Local Government, Territories and Roads) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That the bill be now read a second time.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006 amends the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act 1983, the ABC Act, to abolish the staff elected director and deputy staff elected director positions.

The position of a staff elected director is uncommon amongst Australian government agency boards. The position at the ABC was introduced in 1975. It was abolished in 1978, reintroduced in 1983 and given legislative backing in 1985.

The position of a staff elected director is not consistent with modern principles of corporate governance and a tension relating to the position on the ABC board has existed for many years.

This tension is manifested in the potential conflict that exists between the duties of the staff elected director under the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act 1997 to act in good faith in the best interests of the ABC and the appointment of that director as a representative of ABC staff and elected by them. The election method creates a risk that a staff elected director will be expected by the constituents who elect him or her to place the interests of staff ahead of the interests of the ABC where they are in conflict.

This matter was recognised in the June 2003 Review of the Corporate Governance of Statutory Authorities and Office Holders, otherwise known as the Uhrig review, at pages 98 and 99. That review concluded:

The Review does not support representational appointments to governing boards as representational appointments can fail to produce independent and objective views. There is the potential for these appointments to be primarily concerned with the interests of those they represent, rather than the success of the entity they are responsible for governing.

It has been suggested by some that the Uhrig review was not applicable to the ABC. This is incorrect. The Uhrig review was given a broad brief and its findings are relevant across government. The terms of reference of the review included ‘to develop a broad template of governance principles that, subject to consideration by government, might be extended to all statutory authorities and office holders’.

The review was asked to consider the governance structures of a number of specific statutory authorities and best practice of corporate governance structures in both the public and private sectors. The Uhrig review principles are considered generally applicable and all statutory authorities are being considered in relation to them.

There is a clear legal requirement on the staff elected director that means he or she has the same rights and duties as the other directors, which includes acting in the interests of the ABC as a whole. The government is of the view that there should be no question about the constituency to which ABC directors are accountable.

Evidence presented by a former staff elected director to the recent Senate Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts Legislation Committee hearings on this bill confirmed that staff elected directors are, at times, placed under pressure by staff to act in ways which are not consistent with their roles as directors.

The bill resolves these tensions by abolishing the staff elected director positions. This change will contribute to the efficient functioning of the ABC board, is in line with modern corporate governance principles and will provide greater consistency in governance arrangements for Australian government agencies.

The bill is intended to give effect to the abolition of the staff elected director positions as close as possible to the expiry of the term of the current staff elected director.

Despite the abolition of the staff elected director position on the ABC board, the government expects the ABC board and management to continue to take the interests of staff into account in its deliberations.

I commend the bill to the House, and I present the explanatory memorandum to the bill.

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006 is the latest instalment in the Howard government’s ideological crusade against the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Armed with its Senate majority, the government is determined to remake the ABC—and, dare I say, maybe in its own image—and stamp out any semblance of independence. This legislation is bad news for Australians—Australians who care about a strong and independent ABC. This bill has significant implications for the governance of the ABC. It implements an announcement in March by the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Senator Coonan, that the government would restructure the ABC board. The proposed restructure consists of just one measure: the abolition of the position on the board that is held by a director elected by the ABC staff and, knowing the size of the ABC and the number of staff, it would obviously be an important position and one that is representative and serves its role well.

This position has been in place under Labor and coalition governments for the last 23 years. The board of the ABC is a body charged with significant responsibilities. ABC directors are required to be the guardians and protectors of a national asset that has been built up by generations of Australians over more than 70 years. The board is charged with responsibility for ensuring that the ABC fulfils the charter given to it by this parliament and it is a special role in Australian culture. The board must also maintain the independence and integrity of the ABC and ensure that the gathering and presentation of news and information is accurate and impartial.

Labor believes that the parliament should maximise the likelihood of those appointed as directors of the ABC being capable of fulfilling these duties. Regrettably, that is not what this legislation does or is about. There is no evidence to support the proposition that the removal of the staff elected director will in any way enhance the operation of the ABC board. In fact, the overwhelming evidence is that the removal of the staff elected director will reduce the level of broadcasting expertise on the board.

In moving this bill, the government has concocted an argument that the staff elected director is subject to a potential conflict of interest because of who that person is. The government contends that staff elected directors may feel obliged to represent the interests of the people who elect them rather than to act in the best interests of the ABC which, if you really think about it, implies a whole range of things about their responsibilities and duties as a board director. We have not heard any government members actually challenge any staff elected directors on any specifics or charge them with any specifics for dereliction of duty, if that were to be the case.

Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It will come!

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The proposition that the staff elected directors suffer from a conflict of interest is completely without foundation. Section 8 of the ABC Act is quite clear: the obligations of all directors, regardless of how they are elected, are the same, regardless of whether they are elected by the staff or appointed by the government.

I heard an interjection, ‘There’s more coming,’ or ‘You’ll see.’ If the directors’ responsibilities are the same, regardless of whether they are elected by the staff or appointed by the government, you would use the same arguments. If there is some conflict of interest in the view that perhaps a board director elected by the staff would feel obliged to maybe represent the staff, could you not use that exact same principle, in theory, to say, ‘A board director appointed by the government may feel obliged as some sort of duty to represent the government’?  The government cannot have it both ways. If their argument is that a staff elected board director may feel obliged to represent the people who elected them to that position, I would say, ‘Perhaps the people who the government appoint feel obliged in the same manner, as human beings, to have some sort of allegiance to the government.’ I would be very careful if I were a government minister proposing that as the reason this position must be abolished. It is a very interesting theory from the government.

During the Senate Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts Legislation Committee inquiry into this bill, the government completely failed to produce any evidence that staff elected directors had themselves failed to comply with their duties to the ABC. They simply complied with all their responsibilities and duties to the ABC. There are a range of provisions under the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act and the ABC Act that are available to discipline directors who breach their duties.

There have been rumours and unsubstantiated innuendo about leaking and there always will be. Governments, particularly this one, are always very panicky that somebody out there might actually find out what they are doing. Everything has to be watertight. They do not want anyone to know what they are doing. It all has to be watertight. You cannot have somebody reporting what is going on. That is what they are really concerned about: the possibility that someone has leaked something. This is a bill that is driven by one thing and one thing alone—extreme ideology in a desire to control the ABC.

Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ha, ha!

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Again, I hear an interjection, ‘Ha, ha,’ but there is not much else in this bill. This bill does one thing: it gets rid of the one person who is on the board of the ABC, who may have some founded understanding of the ABC because they actually come from the ABC. They are not some party hack the government has put up in the last five minutes. They are somebody who has worked there, who has a commitment to the ABC and the Australian people. Again, the government cannot have it both ways.

This bill is driven by ideology, as are most of the bills—I will not list all of them because I do not have enough time, but I think people do understand where I am coming from—instead of a genuine concern about the ABC itself, corporate governance or anything to do with fulfilling the responsibilities of board directors.

The Senate committee heard from the current staff elected director and the three previous ones. All showed a clear understanding that it is not the role of the staff elected director to represent ABC staff on the board. I cannot imagine why anyone would even think that. They are not elected to represent staff on a board; they are elected to carry out the responsibilities that come with the position. I do not think there is any confusion in the mind of any board director about what they are, but this is where it gets tricky. The perceived activities or the perceived work of board directors can be seen in many different lights, particularly if you are a one-eyed government. If you do not get everything going 100 per cent your way then of course there is some sort of a conspiracy going on or something is happening behind the scenes—perhaps somebody is talking, somebody is leaking, maybe somebody has found something out.

As Quentin Dempster stated, ‘The staff director is not the shop steward for the unions.’ He is right; that is not their role. Staff-elected directors have a proud record of defending the interests of the ABC, even if governments do not like it—whether it be your government, our government or any government. They have a good track record of that.

In 2002 Kirsten Garret opposed a lucrative exclusive deal between the ABC and Telstra because it would have allowed Telstra to influence ABC production decisions, so it was a good decision. In the mid-1990s Quentin Dempster opposed backdoor sponsorship arrangements that contravened the ABC Act. In both cases the staff elected directors resisted proposals benefiting ABC staff because they came at the cost of undermining the independence of the ABC.

In making its case, the government has also relied on the Uhrig Review of the corporate governance of statutory authorities and office holders. In that report Mr Uhrig cautioned against representational appointments to government boards, as we heard from the minister in his introduction, but Mr Uhrig’s report provides thin support for the removal of the ABC staff elected director. Contrary to what the government has claimed, Mr Uhrig did not examine governance arrangements at the ABC. He did not interview the chairman of the ABC, nor did he interview any other past or present ABC directors. It would seem that a few people might have been missing from that review. In fact, the terms of reference of the review required Mr Uhrig to focus on government agencies with ‘critical business relationships’. The Australian Taxation Office, the ACCC, APRA, ASIC, the Reserve Bank of Australia, the Health Insurance Commission and Centrelink were specifically named in the terms of reference—so that was the focus and that is what the Uhrig review and report were about; they were not necessarily about the ABC and its staff elected director. By the way, these entities are very different from the ABC. I think people would acknowledge that you cannot really make a comparison between the Australian Taxation Office and the ABC.

Chris Pearce (Aston, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That’s for sure.

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That’s absolutely for sure. The Australian Taxation Office does a wonderful job, and I will just leave it there.

Chris Pearce (Aston, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Are you saying the ABC doesn’t?

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I will take the interjection from the minister. I thought he was denigrating the Australian Taxation Office so I was defending the Australian Taxation Office. I know you are denigrating the ABC, so I will defend the ABC as well. I believe in defending all of our Australian institutions—unlike this government. The ABC is one of Australia’s most important national institutions. Labor believes it has a vital role to play in developing and reflecting our culture and national identity—very important. It has been doing that for more than 70 years, something this government—and these government members present—has been opposed to for a very long time. Labor believes that it is inappropriate to apply a template developed for agencies like Centrelink, for example, and then take that template and try to squeeze it over the top of the ABC.

There is a strong case for retaining the staff elected director position on the ABC board. This position has always been occupied by experienced public broadcasters. In the election to appoint a new staff elected director earlier this month, the ABC staff elected Quentin Dempster. Mr Dempster has given many of my colleagues—for example, members of the Iemma New South Wales government—a tough time on the New South Wales Stateline program. It is not as if any of us are exempt from raising the hackles of the ABC staff, but that in itself is no excuse to defund them, try to shut them down, do something like getting rid of the staff elected director or apply some pain to them, as seems to be this federal government’s course of action. Mr Dempster is a journalist with tremendous broadcasting experience. He has worked as a journalist at the ABC for more than 20 years. During this time he served as the staff elected director in the mid-1990s—and I referred to that earlier. This sort of expertise in public broadcasting has been in short supply on the ABC board over the last decade, the 10 years since this government came to power.

Government Members:

Government members interjecting—

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Again I hear snickers and some interjections. Obviously this government thinks there is only one type of person that you could possibly have on the ABC board. Maybe when government members get a turn to speak on this, they can describe to us the type of person, the type of character, that they are looking for—people with special attributes like perhaps having a Liberal Party membership card and ‘board experience’.

Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

How about David Hill—a candidate for the Labor Party!

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am not arguing anything in particular; I am just making points of fact about what this government is doing in legislation, in black and white right here in front of us. This government should now explain to Mr Dempster why it thinks that he is not a suitable person. I think most people would think he is a very suitable person.

So what changes for the ABC is this government trying to pursue? What things does it fear from the staff elected director? What things does this government fear the staff elected director would oppose or otherwise support or actually do that another director may or may not do in carrying out their responsibilities under the law? Directors actually have some very special responsibilities under the law. The minister is on record as saying that the board could consider whether it wanted to, for example, allow advertising. There is nothing in the ABC Act that would stop the ABC placing ads on its website. Perhaps this is what the minister had in mind when he was putting together this legislation. The ABC’s digital content creators must be free to produce material without worrying about offending the sponsors of the ABC website. The parliament should not lightly silence the voice of a strong defender of ABC independence or anybody who defends the ABC. In a recent Bulletin article the minister stated:

... it won’t be the same ABC it is today in a year’s time; we are in for some very exciting changes ...

You do not have to be Einstein to work out the code. In fact, you do not have to work for the ADF to work out the code in ‘some very exciting changes’. It will be very exciting when there is a board party and everyone of the same ilk can turn up. Given this government’s track record on the ABC, Australians who value it will be concerned to hear about these changes. This bill is all about control. It is about more control by this government over independent organisations, more control over what people read, over what people see, over what people hear and over what content is delivered to people—that is the intent of this bill. Five years ago, the Senate communications committee examined the methods of appointment to the board. Back then government senators stated:

There has been no suggestion that the position of staff elected director will be abolished.

But now the government’s Senate majority has gone to its head, as with a whole range of other areas, and that position is in doubt. The staff elected position is just one position of a possible nine on the ABC board, so personally I cannot see how just getting rid of that one position should have some huge impact on any possible decision of the board itself. But I think that the real waste, the real tragedy, is that by getting rid of this position the government actually removes a voice of experience, a voice from the ABC itself. If you take a business approach to this and look at boards around the country, it is often the case that the best boards are those with directors with 20 or 30 years of industry experience, those that have actually worked through the business or understand the business closely and actually do the best jobs. I think it is no different to the ABC’s having a staff elected director position on the board.

What irritates the Prime Minister about the staff elected director is that it is a position that is beyond the capacity of the Prime Minister to influence or control as he does in so many other areas. Since 1996, the government has regularly filled board vacancies with its own conservative mates; people like Janet Albrechtsen, Ron Brunton and Michael Kroger have been dispatched to the ABC with instructions to attack what the senior Liberals see as a left-wing bias. They are really worried about this left-wing bias. God forbid that the ABC might go out there and do some reports or programming or say something that just does not sit comfortably with this government. If it does not sit comfortably with this government then what does the government do? It changes the board. It gets the board active and makes sure that the government has a huge hand and a role in what happens. The role that certain people obviously play is to guide and steer the ABC, not down the impartial middle of the road and certainly not to the left but to guide and steer it slightly to the right, ever inching further and further to the right.

Chris Pearce (Aston, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Pearce interjecting

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer interjects, ‘We wish.’ You do not have to wish. You are doing it through legislation. This is the whole point. I do not even have to argue this case. I will just let the government argue it for me. They are actually giving me the ammunition and material. ‘We wish.’ Hopefully Hansard has actually got this on the record, it was loud enough for everybody to hear, ‘We wish.’ Of course you wish because that is what you want. You would want to control every single director, not just one, two, three or four. Get rid of the staff.

Chris Pearce (Aston, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That’s rubbish.

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Too late now, you have said it. It is not rubbish now, you are on the record—you have let it out of the bag.

Harry Jenkins (Scullin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The member for Oxley will convey his remarks through the chair.

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The parliamentary secretary has let it out of the bag. It is just unbelievable. Last year, research conducted by Newspoll found that 82 per cent of people actually believe—and I think they have good reason to—that the ABC is balanced and even-handed in its reporting of news and current affairs. Not all Liberals share the government’s hatred of the ABC however—amazing as that is. In March, the former leader of the Liberal Party John Hewson wrote in the Australian Financial Review:

... the Government’s recent decision to stop staff electing a director of the ABC board is a churlish pyrrhic victory for some of the ideologically-based antagonists in the Liberal Party and some of their sympathetic business mates.

John Hewson has it right. He has been freed from the shackles. He has got the ball and chain off, he can say whatever he likes now and he is telling it how it is. It is a churlish victory for the government to get rid of somebody on a board, just because it thinks they may do or say something that is not in the thought processes that this government is on about. John Hewson went on:

It is clearly against the best interest of the institution and the listening and viewing public.

I assume many Liberals in this House agree with their former leader, but will any of them have the courage to stand up and say so? Will any of them have the courage to stand up for ordinary people; will they stand up for workers? I do not think so, because we saw that today and we have seen it in legislation. They will not stand up for anyone except themselves and their big business mates. That is it.

Labor believes that the abolition of the staff elected director’s position will have a significant detrimental impact on the effectiveness of the ABC board and undermine public perceptions of its independence. The government is slowly chipping away at the block, slowly making sure there is no independence left. Everybody there will have some sort of a relationship. There are not too many spots unfilled that contain staff who are not related to somebody specifically in the Liberal Party or who have had some sort of staffer role or something like that.

The staff elected director, as I said before, has a unique insight into the ABC operations. They can play a key role in assisting the board to hold ABC management to account. The truth is that this bill is not about improving the ABC’s corporate governance; it is about fulfilling the wishes of the government. That is what this bill is about. It is just a further attempt by the government to undermine the independence of the ABC.

Chris Pearce (Aston, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You can’t get it out.

Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This legislation is so unpalatable, you are right, I cannot get it out. This legislation is simply the latest instalment in the government’s decade-long ideological crusade against the ABC. This government has a track record of defunding, shutting down, removing power from and abolishing any organisation that does not fit the white picket fence ideological bent that this government has as to what organisations should think, say and do. For a decade the ABC has been starved of the funds it needs to be the world-class broadcaster that Australians expect, deserve and need.

In the first Costello budget in 1996, the ABC funding was cut by $66 million. This funding has never been adequately restored. In real terms, the ABC has less money today to make programs than in 1996. I do not have time to get into it fully but also we see that gradual loss of Australian content from the ABC because of a lack of funding. Before the last election, the government promised an independent review of the adequacy of the ABC’s funding. This review was conducted by KPMG at the massive cost to taxpayers of half a million dollars but the government have refused to release that half a million-dollar report to the public. Why would you have a report on the ABC and the effectiveness of funding and then refuse to release it publicly? You would think that they have something to hide. But luckily there were some leaks; somebody did leak the KPMG report and it suggested a number of things. In March, it was reported that KPMG found that the ABC needed an extra $125 million over the next three years just to maintain existing services.

Despite all the claims by the minister of a great outcome for the ABC in the budget, the fact is that the ABC is still chronically underfunded. The ideologically motivated funding squeeze continues. While the opposition opposes this bill, we do believe in some reform to the ABC board. There is public concern about the ABC’s corporate governance but it does not relate to the role of the staff elected director. There is a clear conservative bias on the current ABC board. If the government were to go by no other measure than by the background of some of the directors, you would have some idea of what they are actually doing.

Reforms are needed to strengthen public confidence in the independence of the ABC. There was a time when the Prime Minister claimed to understand the importance of the independence of the ABC. Back in 1995, he railed against appointments made by the Keating government. So there you go: when they were in opposition, they did one thing and now they are in government, they are doing another. Back then, he lectured all of us. He said, ‘You not only must have a board that is completely politically neutral but it must be seen to be neutral.’

That is right. That is what John Howard said—‘it must be seen to be politically neutral’. I do not know that the current board actually fits the bill in being seen to be politically neutral. Perhaps the Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer, who is at the table, and other people who are speaking on this bill can enlighten us on this theory of being seen to be neutral. It would be interesting to hear how the Prime Minister thinks his appointments of prominent conservatives like Michael Kroger, Mr Brunton and Ms Albrechtsen measure up against that criterion. John Howard was right back in 1995, but in this area as in so many others he has failed to live up to the principles he espoused when in opposition. The current appointments process lacks transparency and is too politicised.

Under current arrangements, the names of candidates are taken to cabinet by the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, but that is about all the public ever know about the whole process. These are the real questions that need to be asked. How do people apply to fill a board position? What criteria are used to assess candidates? Do you have to be a member of the right club? Which club? What sort of card do you have to carry to get a job in that place? Does it help if you have donated money? That is a good question. It certainly seems to help if you have been a conservative cultural warrior over the years.

Labor believes that there needs to be real reform of the appointments process to guarantee the independence of the ABC board and the expertise of its members. Since 2003 Labor has supported an independent merits based appointments process for ABC and SBS board vacancies. The process is based on the so-called Nolan rules that were developed in the UK and govern appointments to the BBC. Appointments to the ABC board must be open and transparent. I do not think anyone could argue against that. We must have confidence in the people we have in those positions. Vacancies should be publicly advertised. There should be clear, merit based selection criteria. Labor’s policy provides for an independent selection panel to undertake a proper shortlist selection process. This is in stark contrast to current arrangements. The selection of the short list would be independent of the minister.

Under Labor’s model the minister would be free to nominate someone not on the list, but there would be a political price to pay. Obviously, if the minister did that, they would have to account for that to the people of Australia. I think that would be a good thing. The minister would be required to table in parliament a formal statement of the reasons for selecting a candidate who was not on the short list. The publicity surrounding such a move would make it more unlikely that the government would pursue such an option. Labor’s policy would not exclude people previously involved in politics from serving on the ABC board. We do not actually have something against it. We think there needs to be a balance. To get the balance right, you cannot get rid of just one board position—that is, the staff elected one—and then have it completely weighted the other way. There needs to be a balance. It would ensure, however, that they had the skills to do the job and they would be seen as independent by the public because they were not short-listed by the minister. If the government were serious about improving the governance of the ABC, it would withdraw this bill and begin work on reforms reflecting the Nolan principles.

This bill represents a blatant attempt by the Howard government to undermine the independence of Australia’s national broadcaster, the ABC. The ABC is facing a number of challenges over the next few years. Like broadcasters around the world, the ABC will have to adapt to the rise of digital technology and the way it is transforming the media. In the months ahead, the ABC board will choose a new managing director to guide it through this uncharted territory. The ABC needs directors who understand the changing media landscape and the unique nature of public broadcasting. A staff elected director will be well placed to help the board to deal with these tasks. In conclusion, the parliament should not allow the government to replace experienced public broadcasters with yet more political stooges.

Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have to say at the outset how delighted I am to speak on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006. I love the ABC. I love the ABC as the Australian broadcaster, but I do not love all of the ABC. There are elements of the ABC that I do not love. But when I was a schoolteacher I loved having BTN on in the classroom because that was something that the kids really got a lot out of and something that, as a schoolteacher, I saw as fundamentally valuable. That is what the ABC’s function is: to provide great information as a national broadcaster. I will shortly refer to the elements of the ABC that I do not love, and I will explain them in detail.

This bill, as we know, is to amend the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act 1983 to remove the position of the staff elected director from the board of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, or the ABC. As a bit of background, the first staff elected position on the governing body of the ABC was introduced by the Whitlam government without legislation in 1975 and subsequently abolished by the Fraser government. The current position was created by the ABC Act in 1986. The make-up of the board, until this legislation is passed, must include a managing director, a staff elected director and no fewer than five and no more than seven directors. The membership of the ABC board, as at 1 April 2006, is as follows: Mr Donald McDonald AO, the managing director; Mr John Gallagher QC, the deputy; Ms Ramona Koval, who I will come to in much detail later; Dr Ron Brunton; Ms Janet Albrechtsen; Mr Steven Skala; and Mr Murray Green. That makes a total of seven. I will return to those people later.

The Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts announced on 24 March this year that the staff elected director’s position on the ABC board would be abolished. There are a number of issues that the Uhrig report goes into. Basically, the staff elected director’s position has become a conflict of interest. For example, the modern corporate principles of governance do not provide arrangements for staff elected members on corporations and boards generally throughout the rest of the corporate world. By way of example, another public broadcaster in Australia, the SBS, does not have a staff elected representative. So let us not get too excited about this position being removed. The SBS functions quite well, thank you very much, without a staff elected director.

The Uhrig report was released on 12 August 2004 and it made a number of recommendations and observations. The review concluded that there was ‘no universally agreed definition of corporate governance’ and suggested the following definition:

Corporate governance encompasses the arrangements by which the power of those in control of the strategy and direction of an entity is both delegated and limited to enhance prospects for the entity’s long-term success, taking into account risk and the environment in which it is operating.

It said a lot more, and time does not permit me to go through all the detail; you can read the Uhrig report. But it did not support representational appointments as per the member opposite; the Uhrig report made that quite clear. It does set out quite a number of obligations of elected board members. It says, for example:

Whether staff representatives make a practice of prosecuting the interests of staff is moot but it is clear that the legal duty of such board members is not to their constituents but to the organisation more generally.

Yet, as we will find out, Ms Ramona Koval considered that the staff that elected her to the board were her constituents. So we already have a conflict of interest. The duties of directors include duties of care and diligence and that they must act in good faith. They have a duty not to misuse their position and a duty not to misuse information, which I will come to in some detail. We know that the Senate committees have examined this issue, and the fact is that Ramona Koval was asked to sign certain ABC protocols and she would not do it.

Let me say at the outset that the ABC board is generally like most other boards of governance, and it is a government appointed board. Let us be fair—there have been appointments from both sides of government. For instance, we know that right back at the beginning Senator Neville Bonner was one of the first appointed members of the ABC board. I do not hear any complaints about Senator Neville Bonner. He obviously carried out his duties. Yet he was a Liberal senator.

Right throughout the history of the appointments to the ABC board there have been appointments by governments of people in whom they have a great deal of faith—for example, on our side of government, we have had Michael Kroger, a well-known member of the Liberal Party, and Ross McLean, the former member for Perth. But, on the other side of the equation, we have to look no further than Mr John Bannon, the former Labor Premier of South Australia—we are talking about political appointments—and Wendy Silver, who I knew well in Perth and who was a good friend of the Burke government. The Reserve Bank and other government instrumentalities have appointments by the government of the day. And when another government comes, of course they appoint alternative people.

I suppose we really could call this the Ramona Koval amendment to the ABC bill, because she has precipitated this. I feel sorry for the other staff members—Tom Molomby, John Cleary, Quentin Dempster, Kirsten Garrett and Ian Henschke—because none of them has really had to be so obviously dragged into the spotlight because of their misuse of their position on the board as has Ramona Koval. And, yes, I do agree with the member opposite: Quentin Dempster is a highly regarded member of the ABC. He is an excellent, quality reporter, and I do not think his independence is questioned. He is in the position of being elected, before this bill comes into place. And he can thank Ramona Koval for the gross leaking and her lack of loyalty to her corporate governance duties, which resulted in this position being abolished. Other members of the ABC staff might also want to thank Ramona Koval for bringing this position into disrepute and having it examined in terms of a conflict of interest, because she is largely the one who has brought it into conflict.

We know that this was brought to a head when Maurice Newman, a board member, abruptly resigned, citing a gross breach of boardroom confidentiality. Mr Maurice Newman is a very credible man—he was also the chair of the Australian Stock Exchange—and he blamed the decision directly on the ABC staff elected director, Ramona Koval. He said that he could not continue as the serious lapse of boardroom confidentiality had the potential to destabilise the corporation and that he had no faith that the accepted governance standards would be observed by the board while they allowed Ramona Koval to continue in that position.

Ms Koval justified the leaking. It was reported in the Australian that she had said that it was her duty to send emails to staff on the deliberations and the decisions taken by the ABC board. She may think that leaking board information for the benefit of sectional interests within the ABC rather than for the benefit of the corporation as a whole was the right thing to do.

Who did she leak this information to? Interestingly—and I will move to some of these other people in a moment—none other than that great left-winger David Marr, who was the ABC’s Media Watch representative for some time. In fact, if there was still an active communist party in this country, I imagine David Marr would be the president, secretary and general manager of the whole shooting match; he is so left wing he is out of kilter. Interestingly, he is still a great friend of the cultural echelons of the ABC—you see him on Insiders regularly. But I will return to Mr Marr shortly.

The question the board may wish to ask Koval is why she thinks she is entitled to send memos to staff about boardroom machinations. Koval admitted to the Australian that since her election to the board she has sent out eight memos. We are not talking about somebody who has been misinterpreted or who has got it wrong. In an article on 26 May 2004, she admitted to the Australian that since her election to the board she has sent out eight memos to the staff, reporting on boardroom meetings. Revealingly, those memos included a preamble that said that her report to staff contained a summary of the representations she had made on behalf of staff and decisions taken by the board. Koval needs to understand whether she is there in the interests of the board or in the interests of her constituents, as she calls them. Obviously reform of the ABC board is needed when you have this situation.

Returning to the culture of the ABC, let me say again that I have always been a great supporter of the ABC. I generally like its news coverage, its educational coverage and its National Geographic type coverage with David Attenborough and all these sorts of things that are fantastic for young people and educators. But the ABC has absolutely left the rails in the current affairs area. We have to look no further than the political links of the broadcasters who are on the ABC today and who have been previously with the ABC.

We do not have to go any further than Kerry O’Brien, who has been the ABC’s 7.30 Report reporter for 10 years. In the electorate, people come to me and say, ‘Why can’t you blokes do something about that Kerry O’Brien? He is just so biased towards the conservative side of government.’ I have seen him interviewed on this, and he said, ‘I don’t care. I’m here. I’m so powerful that nobody is going to address me. I’ll do what I like. If they don’t like it, so what? I’ll go.’

That is fine. He is obviously a man of intelligence and somebody who is quite good at an analytical report. But it is where he slips off into his left wing rhetoric that it gets people. When he interviews the Prime Minister or a minister or member of the coalition, his body language is turbid and angry. Yet when Mr Beazley or someone from the other side is before him, it is almost, ‘Oh, buddy, old pal, how are you? How are we going?’

His history is that he worked as a press secretary for the Labor leader Gough Whitlam and then for the deputy Labor leader Lionel Bowen. He has a bit of a CV on the other side. He is a Labor staffer. How can you say that he is not unbiased? Kerry O’Brien has probably been responsible for the ABC disappointing many people in the public and, I know, our party. We are sick and tired of the way that he continually drives home his ideological hatred for the conservative side of government. Kerry O’Brien basically does a good job, as I said, but he has to get himself out of this left wing bent.

Another strong ABC current reporter—and he seems to be a nice bloke—is Barrie Cassidy. He does the Insiders. I like watching the Insiders. But again he is a former Labor Party staffer. He worked for Bob Hawke as specialist media adviser from 1987 until about August 1991. You cannot get away from your past. You are what you are because of what you have been. These guys are very strong supporters of the other side.

There is a left wing culture in the ABC. They bring their families through the same cultural incantations and inductions to become members of the ABC staff or in broadcasting. This is where we have a bit of a problem with current affairs. They are not balanced. We know that when Richard Alston did an inquiry into this, he found 68 occasions just during the Iraq war where the reporting was quite biased.

I suppose I should mention Maxine McKew. Maxine McKew—even though I am not going to deliberately say that she has been involved in the Australian Labor Party—is married to a former national secretary of the Labor Party, Bob Hogg. In the Latham Diariesthat name that should not be mentioned here—what did Mark Latham say about Maxine McKew? He said that they were going to try to fit her up for the seat of Fowler. I do not know what the current member for Fowler thinks about that. They were going to put her in the seat of Fowler because they wanted to anoint one of their hereditary peers. But Maxine McKew did not want to go and live there. She could not stand the people. She lives in the leafy suburbs by the shore. She did not want to go and live with those grommets over in Fowler. They were not her kind of people. So she declined. There is a fair bit of history.

The funny thing about it is this. At the national level, the ABC carries on with this sort of behaviour. The further away from Canberra you get, the less shrill it is. In Perth, for example, there is no greater political reporter than Peter Kennedy. Peter Kennedy is balanced. He is a gentleman and he does a fantastic job in the ABC. He is very unbiased. As late as today we had the ABC’s Fran Kelly on the Radio National Breakfast program, absolutely getting stuck into the government and this side of politics about customary Aboriginal law and banging on about political correctness.

This is the problem that we have with the ABC. I had the Friends of the ABC in Perth write to me about Iran and Iraq, the hard right lobby groups and the Howard ministers and their other cronies—complaining about Alston’s 68 complaints on the ABC et cetera. I have to tell the Friends of the ABC in Western Australia that I have never seen anybody so embittered as them. They do not represent mainstream opinion in this country.

The member opposite said that the ABC had been denuded of funds. The previous director, Mr Russell Balding, was very pleased with the previous budget because the ABC had received $88.2 million for new initiatives. That is a huge top-up of money. It did not expect anything close to that amount. Can I say that the ABC really needs to focus itself on local talent, on local productions and on local drama. Previously, the ABC was where young actors, drama writers et cetera in this country cut their teeth. The ABC gave them an opportunity to do short dramas, particularly Australian based dramas. To make sure that that does not get overlooked in the current affairs shenanigans that the ABC likes to run, $30 million of this is for local TV content—in other words, local dramas. That has been dedicated, as it should be, to the local talent in this country. It will be great to see how the ABC uses this in its new directions because, ultimately, this is where the future of this country is.

The ABC has a role to play in this country as the national broadcaster, but the fact is that if you cannot run a board because somebody cannot abide by the corporate governance rules then you cannot have them on the board. At the end of the day, Ramona Koval is somebody who has gone outside the boundaries. She would not sign any compact on this. Basically, she said that she is going to do what she can to spill the information on a large corporation like this. As a result, we had to look at reforming the board.

In conclusion, a general proposition of modern Anglo-American governance theory tends not to support the appointment of staff elected representatives to major boards of large corporations. In this case, I strongly support this bill for the direction in which it is going to take the ABC. (Time expired)

Peter Garrett (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Reconciliation and the Arts) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Labor opposes the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006, which reduces the maximum number of directors on the ABC board from nine to eight by abolishing the position of staff elected director. Upon reflecting on the recent comments by the member for Canning, I draw to his attention the fact that the Chairman of the ABC is a friend of the Prime Minister, that the newly appointed Managing Director of the ABC has past connections with the Liberal Party and that it is the purpose of the ABC to provide us with a diversity of opinions, not only opinions or views that the member or his colleagues agree with.

This staff elected position has been a feature of the ABC board for a number of years. It is a position that has been held in the past by people with wide broadcasting and media experience. It is a position that allows for in-depth knowledge and an organisational perspective of the ABC distinct or different from that of externally appointed board members.

The government claims this bill is a reform measure. It is nothing of the sort: it is a revenge measure. The government has had what it perceived to be the bias of the ABC in its sights ever since it was first elected. Its first action upon election was to freeze the funding of the ABC. No clearer message or signal could be sent to the corporation about the government’s faith or views about the ABC than that first primary action from whence all other actions have flowed.

The government have a lack of faith in the ABC that is more a reflection of their bias and values than it is of any quantitative or qualitative assessment of the corporation. I merely make the point, which will have been made at other times in the House, that KPMG conducted a funding adequacy review and found that the ABC is a world leader, that it is efficient, that it is innovative and that it needs significant funding.

Notwithstanding that, the government has a lack of faith in the ABC and an enmity towards the ABC that has been expressed on numerous occasions. It has become an article of faith for this government, and we have heard yet another display of it from the previous speaker. So any measure, however insignificant or petty, which reinforces this sentiment is seen to be a good thing. It is a political goal that has been kicked. What a pitiable state we are witnessing when a government uses its control of the parliament in this way.

I invite the House to consider the past decade of intense media reflection and examination of the government’s actions in relation to refugees, AWB, the falsifying and manipulation of reasons to go to war in Iraq—any number of contentious issues of the past decade—where this government has been exposed by the ABC. I ask the House to reflect on that fact. I also ask the House to reflect on the fact that the same thing would have happened and should have happened if it had been a Labor government. The primary purpose of the ABC is not to report on the government in the way in which it sees as being favourable or unfavourable to its performance but to report in a way which it sees and exercises to its best ability as being fair but befitting serious scrutiny.

The ABC, as befits its role as a national broadcaster, has inquired and reported. The government has taken some heat and it did not like it. That happens to governments of all persuasions, and when they are responsible for funding the organisation they need to resist the temptation to interfere in the way in which this government is doing with this board appointment. Unfortunately, the government cannot resist, so this bill represents a little bit of revenge, a little bit of payback. It has nothing to do with good governance, and it should be seen for what it represents. We oppose it for that reason.

The plain fact is that, if this government were serious about addressing and improving the corporate governance of the ABC in relation to board appointments, it would simply stop stacking the board with appointees whose ideological obsessions match theirs or, in the case of board member Michael Kroger, have a longstanding political association with the government.

The government has asserted that the bill is about removing the possibility for potential conflict of interest between the duties of a director appointed under the Commonwealth authorities act and their election to the position of board member by the staff of the ABC. This is a nonsense, when all the remaining positions are directly appointed by the government and where in the past and certainly today some of those appointments are political in nature. Conflict of interest can hardly be sustained as a charge against having a staff elected position in this case.

The government also claims that, as distinct from other board appointments, the very fact of staff election to a board creates a higher likelihood of a conflict of interest, as the elected board member’s independence is compromised and, as a consequence, they would be less able to fulfil their statutory duties as a board member. If that is the case, the government should take the appropriate action instead of bringing legislation into the House. If a board member has shown a conflict of interest or compromised their position, there is legislation to deal with it.

But this argument does not have substance, because it ignores the fact that board members’ responsibilities and duties are already described under existing legislation. For example, in the case of the ABC, all board members, including the staff elected representative, are bound by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act and by the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act 1997 which—with the exception of subsection 17(1)(a), which  provides for non-disclosure of interests by a board member in the case of discussions concerning terms and conditions of employment—provide that the legal duty of staff elected board members is as it is for each and every board member—namely, to the organisation itself. That is as it should be. That is good governance. Legislation is in place and board members are bound by it.

The fact is that these legislative provisions—including the ABC Act and the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act that I have just referred to—make clear, in the case of the ABC Act, the obligations of board members and, in the case of the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act, the penalties that apply in the event that directors breach their duties. Of course, this duty would apply to other similar staff elected positions which are present in organisations such as the ANU or the Australian Film and Television School.

The fact of election is not the source of a conflict of interest, as it is the means by which a board member comes to the board. It is the fact of the proper exercise of board members’ duties that they must fulfil which goes to the heart of the debate about conflict of interest. If they are in breach of their duties, the minister can act. Is she acting here? No. Why not? The reason is a simple one: there are no grounds to act. This is merely a case of there being a staff elected representative, a position that the government wants only to abolish.

Additionally, the government claims that the removal of a staff elected representative is consistent with the recommendations of the Uhrig review. As is often the case in the House, arguments are put to cut the suit of the prejudice of those making the claims. But the Uhrig review was concerned with examining ‘critical business relationships’ in relation to organisations including the Reserve Bank, the Australian Taxation Office and the Health Insurance Commission. It was not concerned with the governance arrangements of the ABC.

Subsequent commentary by, amongst others, Professor Stephen Bartos, Director of the National Institute of Governance, whom the government also relies upon to buttress its arguments for this bill, provides some context for the argument. When Professor Bartos made his submission to the Senate inquiry into this bill he said, ‘Notwithstanding that the Uhrig report did not support the representational appointment to governing boards, it was not specifically concerned with staff elected positions.’ He said that, further, it did not make any formal recommendations on this matter and that the comments about representational appointments, which are common enough in the Public Service, were concerned in the main with government department representations. In other words, Professor Bartos’s comments draw a distinction between the kind of organisation that the ABC is and the kinds of organisations that were the remit of the review and the report done by Mr Uhrig. In any case, Professor Bartos goes on to remark that there are advantages and disadvantages to elected board positions and that it depends on how one views the organisation. Fair enough. The import of his remarks is that it is reasonable to view the ABC as having a character distinct, say, from commercial radio and television stations. Professor Bartos said:

In governance terms, the choice of model to be adopted for a public sector body should not be static or formulaic, but be driven by the objectives of the organisation concerned.

The government has neatly inverted Professor Bartos’s comments as it sought to change the composition of the ABC board to suit its own political objectives. It has done no more or no less than that.

The case here is that the government does not appoint directors to the board of Channel 10 or the Austereo Network, as these organisations are commercial entities with responsibilities to their shareholders. On the other hand, the ABC has a specific charter. It is a national institution. Its shareholders are the Australian people, and nowhere have they claimed that the staff elected position is an affront to their shareholding or that it should be removed. In fact, the general prevailing sentiment, notwithstanding what I have said above regarding the ABC, remains positive. The Mansfield report, amongst other reports on the ABC, has revealed that both staff and the public view the ABC as a special organisation. It is widely supported in the community, and it is not unreasonable to argue that its primary purpose as a public broadcaster to serve the public as opposed to the shareholder interest allows a measure like a staff elected representative.

But this measure has nothing to do with reason and everything to do with revenge. The government wants a tamer ABC. The Prime Minister admitted as much when he lamented the absence of a right-wing Phillip Adams, and subsequently he got his wish—the Counterpoint program was initiated. This bill represents heavy-handed punitive measures by the government, a kind of final, sort of vindictive but unnecessary, burst of antipathy towards the national broadcaster that is still enjoying the confidence of the majority of Australians despite these attacks and despite the government’s own board appointments—and it is held in higher esteem as an organisation than the government that is so often hostile to it.

There have been some extraordinary outbursts by government members, both in this House and in the Senate. Senator Fierravanti-Wells referred to the ‘pernicious left-wing influence that permeates far too much of the ABC’s biased and unbalanced coverage’. Memo to Senator Fierravanti-Wells and her co-conspirators: over 80 per cent of the Australian public believe that the ABC is reasonably balanced. But in other circles, such as psychological circles, what is happening here is called projection. We may as well identify it for what it is. ‘Projection’ is when I project onto another person—or, in this case, an organisation of people—through the prism of my views, what I think their views are; hence the senator’s description ‘pernicious left-wing views’. It is really only those of extreme right-wing views who see in a broadcaster, when it critically reports and investigates events championed by the right, extreme left-wing views. But, regretfully, it seems that the government has been infected with this alarm.

The government has produced a bill that offers no credible reasons for its support. It really looks like the final scene of Witch Hunt. After Senator Alston instituted his series of investigations into bias concerning the reporting of the Iraq war and failed—with the exception of a small number of counts—to prove anything approaching a permeating bias, the die was cast. That ‘small number’ was two out of 68, I would remind the House, regarding the first investigation; it was no more than that. But what to do next? Of course, he went on to the Independent Complaints Review Panel and, I think, ultimately across to the Australian Broadcasting Authority. But the public was not clamouring for heads to roll. To all intents, the current chair has managed to serve the interests of the ABC diligently, although sometimes earning rebuke from others in this House for his work. But, clearly, the position of staff elected representative had to go.

Given that the government appoints all other board members, the bill is about gestures and really has nothing to do with governance and independence. I call on the government to follow up this bill with similar legislation ensuring that ministers do not directly appoint CEOs of stand-alone government entities like the Australian Film Commission. If it were serious about governance, it would consider these things—but, of course, the government will do no such thing.

This bill, regretfully, comes after 10 years of sniping, complaining, undermining and underresourcing by this government of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. It is a campaign that has signally failed to dent the confidence of the public in the ABC, but which has significantly impaired the ABC’s capacity and witnessed the decline in drama productions, which we became aware of last year, and the freezing of funding levels for the ABC in the past.

I acknowledge that this year’s budget contains some much-needed resources for an independent commissioning arm to produce urgently required local documentary and drama, for regional radio and for infrastructure repairs. But this amount does not compensate for past neglect. It is well short of the amount sought by the corporation and well short of the figure identified by the KPMG funding adequacy review, which said that the ABC needed a $126 million increase above inflation over the next thee years to maintain services. The ABC is still underfunded.

Whilst underfunded, thankfully the ABC is still respected. Although many observers have raised concerns about recent board appointments, it is watched and listened to as much as ever, if not more so. The political class that inhabit this place are avid ABC consumers. Member from rural and remote electorates often have the ABC as the only consistent source of timely news and information. Most members I observe draw regularly on the ABC, especially when we dine in the parliamentary dining room. I would say to the House that the ABC continues to play a critical role in ensuring that our democracy is healthy; that, as it is expressed through governments—here and in the states, in the territories and locally—the ABC’s provision of accurate and comprehensive reporting about what governments do is absolutely essential to our democracy. It is the oxygen of democracy—no more and no less than that.

Notwithstanding the rage of commercial broadcasters afoot, the ABC is also the only national media organisation that consistently addresses politics and issues of the day across the country and in the international sphere through news, current affairs reporting, specialist programs, television and radio, podcasting and online. Is the position of a staff elected representative the burning issue for the corporation, given its real achievements and its challenges? Hardly.

Labor has long supported the establishment of an independent process for selecting candidates to fill vacancies on the ABC board. The position of staff elected representative was created in 1975, removed by the Fraser government but five years later restored by the Hawke government. We believe that it is essential to establish a truly independent process for selecting candidates that is both open and transparent. Vacancies should be advertised. There should be clear merit based selection criteria. That is how it happens in the corporate world and that is how it should happen here. An independent panel should conduct a selection process—and it may well turn up people with a background in politics, and there is nothing wrong with that. But, critically, the selection of the shortlist should be independent of the minister. It should no longer be a selection choice by a minister of any government.

Under Labor, the ABC would boast a truly independent board, thus ensuring the removal of perceptions of bias or taints of bias that inevitably accompany appointments that are not truly independent but which are a feature of the current appointment processes as practised by this government. I conclude by reminding the House that, in 1995, the Prime Minister himself said:

You not only must have a board that is completely politically neutral, but it must be seen to be neutral.

In that respect, the legislation that we oppose today and the comments of the Prime Minister stand in complete opposition to one another. We condemn the bill.

Daryl Melham (Banks, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Labor will be opposing the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006. It is bad public policy and bad corporate governance. It is bad public policy because the broadcasting expertise provided by the staff appointed ABC board member has consistently assisted the board in its decision making. It is bad corporate governance because the staff appointed board member, as with all board members, is legally required to fulfil their obligations as a board member with due care and diligence. There is no evidence that due diligence has not been followed by the staff appointed board members over the years.

You cannot just turn around and assert something without producing evidence. There have been many opportunities in the past few months for the government to provide hard evidence. The government has tabled the bill in the Senate, and subsequently senators have spoken on the bill. There have already been several speakers in the House on the bill prior to me, and there was an extensive inquiry by the Senate Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts Legislation Committee. The opposite has occurred: evidence of the value of the staff appointed member has consistently emerged. Indeed, in the Senate inquiry, several examples of the ability of the staff elected representative to put the needs of the corporation before anything else were cited.

One of those instances is particularly indicative. In the period 1996 to 2000, Telstra had approached the ABC for a deal which would allow Telstra to hand-pick from ABC programming, be involved in co-productions and have some influence on internal productions. Not surprisingly, the proposal was heavily weighted in favour of Telstra. The staff elected board member fought the proposal from its outset and from the shop floor, as it were. The staff elected board member, Ms Garrett, was able to demonstrate to her fellow board members that such a deal would impact negatively on the people in the front line and on the public broadcaster generally. The deal was eventually overturned.

A second case in point clearly demonstrates there is a crystal clear distinction between ‘staff elected’ and ‘staff representative’. In the 1990s a matter arose over backdoor sponsorship whereby external parties could influence the content of programs. The ABC was short of cash and there were arguments that the financial injection would potentially save jobs. The staff elected representative argued that external funding was compromising the guidelines of the ABC. Mr Quentin Dempster, a former staff elected ABC board member who has recently been elected again, commented in relation to this issue in his submission to the Senate committee:

Rather than act in the narrow self-interest of the ABC’s staff, the staff elected Director’s role in the exposure was an agonising episode requiring the ABC’s interests and reputation to be placed above those of its employees.

All the staff elected representatives who made submissions or appeared before the Senate committee stated strongly that their role was as a member of the board, not of representing ABC staff. They also noted that, in almost every instance, the staff understood and supported that role. These people clearly understood their responsibilities in terms of corporate governance.

I particularly considered the evidence given to the committee by the unions representing ABC staff. The unions took the line that they would have resented the staff elected board member usurping the position of unions. Mr Graeme Thomson from the Community and Public Sector Union stated to the committee:

To the extent that the staff elected director would seek to usurp the proper role of the trade unions, it would suggest—at least, in our minds—that we would not be able to support the staff elected director. The truth is that the staff elected director is not a staff representative—that is the role of the elected trade unions and the organisation. We believe that quite distinct and complementary roles are performed.

Therefore, the argument proposed by the government that this person would put the interests of staff over their obligations of corporate governance is a fallacy.

In its submission to the Senate committee, the Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance mentioned a previous Senate committee. In 2001 the method of appointments to the ABC board was considered in an inquiry conducted by the committee that considered this matter. A report called Above board? Methods of appointment to the ABC Board resulted from this inquiry. Nothing has changed between 2001 and 2006 in relation to appointments to the ABC board. In that report, however, the report by the government senators supported the maintenance of the status quo of the appointment of board members. The chair recommended the retention of the staff appointed director. What has changed? The government senators at that time were in the majority, as they are now. What has changed is that the government holds the majority in both houses of this parliament. The MEAA continued its submission to the most recent inquiry by arguing:

The Alliance rejects the implicit assertion that staff elected directors cannot and have not been aware of their roles and responsibilities as board directors. They have all been fully aware of their fiduciary and legal responsibilities as board directors ... they are elected for the contribution they can make to the Board, to the good governance of the organization ...

There are very clear legal parameters for the operation of board members enshrined in the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act 1997. The ABC is a Commonwealth authority for purposes of this act. It imposes duties on officers, including directors-general. These include duties of care and diligence, the duty to act in good faith, the duty not to misuse the officers’ position and the duty not to misuse information. To my knowledge, at no time have any of the holders of the position of staff elected director betrayed those principles. To do so would mean they were in breach of their duties under the legislation as it currently stands. One could argue that the premise may as well hold true for those directors appointed by the government through the Governor-General.

This bill is a continuation of the government’s ongoing attack on the ABC. In the second reading speech the Minister for Local Government, Territories and Roads gave a number of reasons for doing away with a staff elected director. There was talk of the tension in relation to the position on the ABC board over many years. There was also the corporate governance argument. Tension of itself is not a basis upon which to abolish a staff elected director’s position. Tension can occur on any board of directors, and it can revolve around particular personalities. I serve as a director of Revesby Workers Club. We have discussions in our board meetings, different sides are taken, the result is accepted and we go forward. With different personalities, there might be more tension—there might be leaking or a whole range of things happening—but that of itself is not a basis for getting rid of a staff elected director.

I think the government should be a bit more honest. I think this is just a policy decision based on the government’s political ideology. Just be up front. Forget about these false arguments. If it is the position of the Liberal Party that there should not be a staff elected director, then just say so. There is no doubt that, when one hears the contributions by members opposite and in the Senate, you can see the paranoia with the ABC and the hatred of the left-wing bias, so-called, of the ABC and particular commentators who were formerly members of the Australian Labor Party or who worked for the ALP. The same could be argued on our side for those with a Liberal bent. My view is that, because you have had a political view in your life, it does not disqualify you from appointment to bodies, whatever they are, and that you look at people on their merits and the contributions they make.

The history of the staff elected position is that it was first introduced by the Whitlam government without legislation in 1975. It was subsequently abolished by the Fraser government. The current position was created by an amendment to the ABC Act in 1986. Because the government now has a majority in the Senate, it is bringing forward its abolition, but I do not believe that it has made out a proper case in relation to corporate governance or tension. Tension can occur between directors who are not elected but who are appointed by a government wanting to take an organisation in a different direction. No-one can tell me that corporate governance sometimes has not been breached by government appointments. This position is being attacked because it is a staff elected position.

The ABC has been served well by staff elected directors and they have made a contribution over the years. Quentin Dempster and Tom Molomby have added to and enriched the ABC and the deliberations of the board. This nebulous argument that there is some tension—and, as such, a particular person thought that the time should come to an end—is a nonsense. I think the government should provide more substance or be more honest about its ideological perspective not supporting such positions. And I think that is a sad thing.

In the past, the ABC has not failed to attract criticism from the Labor Party. When Labor was in government, the ABC rightly scrutinised the government. In many respects, it can be seen as the official opposition by the way it runs a number of programs that delve deeply into which direction a government is heading. But staff elected directors have, in my considered view, added to the ABC. If a rogue director comes along, then deal with the rogue. Do not deal with the principle of the position. Alternatively, be honest and come forth and say: ‘It’s our policy position that no such positions should exist. That is not the way we see the organisation running into the future.’

The corporate governance argument is a nonsense argument. It could apply equally to other directors of the ABC. Where there has been a consistent, continued pattern, you have to demonstrate that a staff elected director has put the ABC’s interests second and the staff’s interests first. The government has not been able to do that. If there were tension between the staff elected director and other members of the board, that of itself is not sufficient to abolish the position. It might say something about the staff elected director. I am not here to vouch for each and every one of them or their characters, because there are some I do not know or I have not met and I have not paid them particular attention. That is a matter that they would have to deal with in subsequent elections. I note that Quentin Dempster was elected to the position recently.

In relation to the ongoing attacks by the government, the Treasurer made much of the injection of $1.6 billion into the ABC over the next three years. The government appointed chairman, Donald McDonald, lauded the government’s generosity in providing $30 million for Australian drama and documentaries, an extra $80 million for specific initiatives, $45 million to upgrade equipment, $13 million for regional local programming and an additional $600 million over the next 10 years for the ABC’s move to digital broadcasting. What both the Treasurer and the ABC chairman failed to mention is that over the past 10 years the ABC has been chronically underfunded and denuded of funds. The operating budget has fallen across that period. The funding this year falls far short of consultant recommendations.

In a leaked report, we are advised that KPMG was commissioned to investigate ABC funding and efficiency. It is understood that the report recommends the government fund the ABC to the tune of an extra $125 million over the next three years. That funding would allow the ABC to continue at its current depleted level of operation—not ensure that the national broadcaster is a strong participant in the emerging digital media environment. Not surprisingly, Minister Coonan has still failed to release the KPMG report. That of itself is a disgrace.

With my colleagues I welcome the additional funding for the ABC. However, only half the amount requested by the ABC was forthcoming. I am advised that the new money will allow the ABC to produce around 28 hours a year of new content. Recent figures show a staggering decline in locally produced drama on the ABC from 100 hours in 2001 to just 20 hours in 2005. Clearly this indicates why the ABC requested a further $38.4 million. Of this, $20 million would have been used to fund an extra 58 hours per year of home-grown drama, documentaries and children’s and arts programming.

Under its charter, the ABC has a responsibility ‘to encourage and promote the musical, dramatic and other performing arts in Australia’. This is quite simply impossible for the national broadcaster without adequate funding. I note the comments made by Judith Rodriguez from the Friends of the ABC in response to this year’s budget. Ms Rodriguez made her comments in the Australian Financial Review on 15 May, where she said:

The government has used the budget to increase its control over the ABC operations: The broadcast triennial base funding has been frozen to the level at which it was cut after the government was elected in 1996. Program funding above the base is tied, targeted to Australian TV drama and documentaries, and regional programming.

Targeted funding overrides the ABC board responsibility of ensuring all areas of the broadcaster charter responsibilities are met.

Ms Rodriguez argues that this starving of the ABC creative base is ‘privatisation by stealth’—a truly terrifying vision, a quite real potential for what is effectively privatisation of the ABC. Imagine government determining programming for the ABC rather than the national broadcaster itself. I do mean ‘government’—not just this government but any government.

The ABC remains a stronghold of independent national broadcasting for this country, yet its very future is threatened. In May 2005 the ABC published, as it does every year, a Newspoll survey on community attitudes. One of the findings was:

... nine in 10 Australians continue to believe the ABC provides a valuable service to the community, and half believe it provides a very valuable service.

The commercial media would kill for such a ringing endorsement. A few years ago, Readers’ Digest asked its readers in Australia to name the brands and institutions they most trusted. The ABC came in as the sixth most trusted government service between public schools and public hospitals and came in ahead of such bodies as the CSIRO and universities. ABC news beat all other television news services. Yet this government continues its politicisation and privatisation of the ABC. The undermining of public trust in such a national institution is appalling. It is worth reiterating the duty of the ABC board as set out in the act:

It is the duty of the board to

(a)

ensure that the functions of the Corporation are performed efficiently and with the maximum benefit to the people of Australia;

(b)

to maintain the independence and integrity of the Corporation;

(c)

to ensure that the gathering and presentation by the Corporation of news and information is accurate and impartial according to the recognized standards of objective journalism ...

The proposed abolition of the staff elected director position on the ABC board will not improve the governance of the ABC, it will not ensure the efficient functioning of the ABC and it most certainly will not maintain the independence and integrity of the ABC. I doubt that it will make the news impartial and accurate according to the standards of ethical journalism. In spirit and in law, the ABC is meant to be independent. This bill continues the attack on the ABC the government has conducted since 1996. (Time expired)

Peter Lindsay (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Banks has made some good points in his contribution to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006. He has indicated that the ABC provides good quality programming and that in the main it attempts to discharge its responsibilities under its charter. Certainly I have no difficulty with the programming on the ABC. I do have some difficulty with some segments, particularly in relation to news, and I will articulate that later in his contribution.

The Australian Labor Party is skating on pretty thin ice in its argument opposing this bill. The Australian Labor Party would do best and gain more credibility in the electorate by stopping being politically correct on this issue and starting to talk about things like good governance, integrity, conflict of interest and how you run a board in a proper way. Rather than appealing to the left-wing, politically correct people in the ABC, it should basically think of the national interest—indeed, the ABC’s interest—and support this bill.

There is no conspiracy here. The government is not into that. That is not why this bill is before the parliament. But there is a conflict of interest having a staff director on the board of this fine Australian organisation. There is a conflict of interest—nobody can deny that—and that conflict of interest has been amply demonstrated. The best evidence of that is the fact that the ASX chief, Maurie Newman, found himself having to resign from the board, blaming a gross breach of boardroom confidentiality. Mr Newman said that he could no longer be assured that accepted corporate governance standards would be observed on the board. He noted the refusal of the staff elected director to agree to the board’s corporate governance protocols.

That clearly points out the conflict of interest that a staff elected director has on the board of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. That cannot be denied. I do not see why the Labor Party should stand in the parliament and deny that because it is just the fact of the matter. There is a conflict of interest and that cannot be allowed to continue. You would not have a conflict of interest on the boards of Australia’s major corporations—the BHPs or Woodsides of this world. It would not be allowed. It would not be tolerated. Nor should we tolerate a conflict of interest on the board of the ABC, and that is why the government is moving to fix this problem. There is no difference between the boardrooms of Australia and the boardroom of the ABC. There has to be good governance, there has to be integrity and there has to be no conflict of interest. It is very hard to find another Australian government agency where there is a staff elected director on the board. For example, the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority, in my area, has no staff elected person—and it does not need one. The board should operate as boards do in the corporate world.

The other point is that there will be no impact on the independence of the ABC by taking the staff elected director off the board—none whatsoever. The ABC remains absolutely independent, as per its charter. Taking a staff elected director off does not change that. A strong board, an impartial board and a board that does not have a conflict of interest is needed to make sure that the ABC meets its charter.

Currently there is an area where the ABC does not meet its charter, and I put it to the parliament that that area is in the reporting of news. Let me be the first person to say that I deal with the ABC virtually every day. I deal with ABC North Queensland, in Townsville. Even though I am aware of the political affiliations of some of the journalists over the years, to a person they have been scrupulously impartial. I am very pleased and proud to be able to say that my ABC reports the news as it is, with no editorial bias. And that is a good thing. The 630 ABC North Queensland newsroom can be proud that they are true professionals.

But you cannot say that about ABC newsrooms in Sydney, Canberra or Melbourne because there is ample evidence of misreporting and bias, and what makes me especially angry is the editorialising, particularly out of Canberra, that occurs in the nightly seven o’clock news service. A news bulletin is to report the news, not to editorialise. I do not mind how much the ABC editorialises in programs like The 7.30 Report, Media Watch, Insiders or whatever. Go for it, because viewers know that that is the kind program it is, but it is despicable, disgraceful and unprofessional that the ABC editorialises in the 7 pm news service. That has to stop—and a strong board has to stop that. I call on the ABC board to do what they need to do to cut out this bias that exists in the Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra newsrooms.

Let me give you an example of this that happened to me last week. I was asked about some comments attributed to Piers Akerman on the Prime Minister’s tenure in the job. I made a very clear comment and, to their credit, ABC radio’s AM program, who were the first to report my comments, reported them accurately—as they should. When I was asked about the Prime Minister I said: ‘The Prime Minister is there for as long as he wants to be. None of us want him to go. He’s a great Prime Minister. But one day he will go—as we all will go—and when Peter Costello takes his place he will do a great job, and he could even do a better job than the Prime Minister.’ I made those comments because we all know that in many corporations you get key people and everybody says, ‘Gee, we don’t want to lose that person; how would you fill that person’s shoes?’ and, when you do lose them, often you get a better person in their shoes, not realising that that can happen. So I was making that point. But how did ABC television report that? They were very clever: they cut out the first bit and just reported the second bit. What they reported is what I said, but they—don’t shake you head, Member for Richmond—

Bruce Scott (Maranoa, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Adelaide.

Kate Ellis (Adelaide, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It’s Adelaide.

Peter Lindsay (Herbert, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I apologise, Kate. Don’t shake your head, because this is true. I can show you the tapes. What they did was to dump the first bit and play the second bit and make it look like I was pushing Peter Costello to be the leader straightaway. That is devious and disgusting. It is not reporting the facts. If the ABC think they have got me as a friend when they do that to me—I am standing here supporting the bill tonight—I will support the ABC board making strong decisions to ensure that the news is reported as the news and as the facts, not as some cleverly edited piece which makes it looks like I said something that I did not say.

I am very pleased to support the bill tonight. I want to see the ABC remain a strong, independent organisation. The government wants to see the ABC remain a strong organisation, and it is only through a board that has integrity, a board that practises the functions of good governance and a board that has no conflict of interest that we will be able to achieve that. I support this bill.

Annette Ellis (Canberra, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise this evening to speak on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006. The aim of this bill is to remove the position of the staff elected director from the board of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, the ABC. Labor oppose this bill because this change is just another example of how we see the Howard government is crushing the independence of the ABC.

This battle between the coalition, to destroy the ABC as we know it, and the Labor Party, to strengthen the ABC, has been going on for many years. The Whitlam government introduced the first staff elected position on the governing board of the ABC back in 1975. The Fraser government subsequently abolished the position. The Hawke government created the current position in 1986. Therefore it comes as no surprise that the Howard government is now trying to remove that position. Unfortunately, with a majority in the Senate, the Prime Minister is simply using his power once again and will end up giving what we believe is another blow to the ABC.

And what excuse is the government giving for this appalling attack on the ABC? The explanatory memorandum for the amendment states:

The Bill addresses an ongoing tension relating to the position of staff elected Director. A potential conflict exists between the duties of the staff elected Director under paragraph 23(1)(a) of the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act 1997 to act in good faith in the best interests of the ABC, and the appointment of that Director via election by ABC staff. The election method creates a risk that a staff elected Director will be expected by the constituents who elect him or her to place the interests of staff ahead of the interests of the ABC as a whole where they are in conflict.

I ask: is there any evidence to show that this conflict—some special form of conflict—actually exists? I believe not. Firstly, the ABC is not the only Commonwealth authority with a staff elected board member, unbeknownst to the previous speaker. Other Commonwealth statutory organisations with staff elected positions on their governing bodies include the Australian National University, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare and the Australian Film, Television and Radio School. Secondly, the legal duty of these board members is to the organisation, not to the people whom they represent, and they are fully aware of this.

To defend this appalling amendment the government has used the Uhrig report, which examined the governance practices of statutory authorities in 2003. The report stated that representational appointments are not consistent with modern principles of corporate governance. But this argument is a sham. The Uhrig review did not specifically examine staff elected appointments, nor did it give any attention to the ABC. The focus of the review was on agencies with critical business relationships, such as the ATO, the ACCC, APRA, ASIC and the RBA.

This bill was referred to the Senate Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts Legislation Committee, which went on to report in May 2006. The Labor, Greens and Democrats senators submitted a dissenting report opposing the bill, and this does not happen lightly. The inquiry examined the unwillingness of the current staff elected director, Ms Ramona Koval, to sign certain ABC protocols. During the inquiry, however, no evidence was produced that any staff elected director had breached their obligations to act in the best interests of the ABC. The report states:

1.18 The staff elected director defended her action in not signing the protocol:

It was about independence. It was about having my decisions and opinions subsumed to the opinions of the rest of the board—so that went to independence, which is an absolute core issue as far as a director of a corporation is concerned. I did not want to be in breach of the law, frankly.

In fact, the Senate committee heard a number of examples where the staff elected director opposed proposals that would have benefited staff, because they would have undermined the independence of the ABC—quite contrary to the argument being put.

There are already remedies available under the Commonwealth Authorities and Companies Act for a breach of director’s duties. In addition, the Governor-General can dismiss a director for misbehaviour. The evidence received by the Senate committee demonstrated that staff elected directors have brought considerable experience in broadcasting to the deliberations of the board.

Clearly, this bill is the latest instalment in what we see as the Howard government’s decade-long attempt to undermine the very independence of the ABC. For 10 years, the government has worked to stack the ABC board with its political mates to try and control the ABC. The staff elected director makes an important contribution to the ABC’s corporate governance. The staff elected director is able to give the board an important insight into ABC operations. Particularly with the current board, the staff elected director is sometimes the only person with the expertise to question the advice coming from the ABC’s executive. If the government were really serious about improving the ABC’s corporate governance, it would end the practice of stacking the board with political friends.

Since 2003, Labor has argued that there should be an open and transparent process for making appointments to the ABC board. Vacancies should be advertised and there should be clear merit based selection criteria. An independent selection panel should conduct the short-list selection process. The selection of the short list would be independent of the minister. If the minister does not appoint a short-listed candidate, he or she should have to table in parliament a formal statement of the reasons for departing from the short list. Labor’s policy would enhance our democracy by strengthening the very independence of the ABC, the base for the discussion in this legislation.

Another way in which the Howard government has undermined the ABC has been through funding. While the budget contained some increases in funding, the appropriation fell well short of the amount requested by the ABC and identified by KPMG as necessary to maintain existing services. According to media reports, the KPMG funding adequacy review found that the ABC needs an extra $125 million above inflation over the next three years just to sustain the current range of services. In my view, it is a disgrace that the minister continues to try and hide the extent of ABC underfunding and refuses to release that KPMG report so that Australians around the country can assess the government’s performance for themselves.

The government’s failure to restore adequate funding means that the ABC will be forced to cut services or—and it is a big ‘or’—look to alternative sources of revenue, such as advertising on its websites. That is a very alarming path down which to travel, and one that we should all be very concerned about even seeing in consideration.

Labor is seeking further information from the ABC on the likely impact of the funding shortfall during the current Senate estimates process. We welcome the additional funding for the production of Australian content. The problem is that the government granted only half the amount requested by the ABC. The new money will allow the ABC to produce around 28 hours a year of new content. As a result, Australian drama production is likely to remain at less than half the level it was five years ago. I do not know how any government can be proud of that sort of record when we think about our public broadcaster.

Regrettably, the government has passed up the opportunity to use the ABC as a vehicle to promote the creation of exciting new digital content. The ABC’s proposal to stimulate interest in digital television and broadband through an extra 200 hours of digital only content was completely rejected. The Howard government’s chronic underfunding of the ABC is depriving Australians of the world class news, information and entertainment services that they expect and deserve.

I am extremely disappointed with the way in which the Howard government has treated the ABC over the past 10 long years, and many of my constituents in the electorate of Canberra have written to me with similar views. We also in the ACT have a very active Friends of the ABC organisation, one that I hold up as a great defender of public broadcasting not only in this city but in this country. The people of Canberra are strong supporters of the ABC and they will be very saddened—pretty appalled, I think—at this bill, which is driven by the Howard government’s extreme ideology and its desire to control the ABC.

I cannot conclude my remarks without responding to the comments of the previous speaker, the member for Herbert, about his disappointment at the methodology in one of the cases he referred to involving the ABC’s Canberra news service. I find it ironic in the extreme that the member for Herbert, with the greatest of respect, was a little bit miffed that part of a quote from him was used and part of the quote was not. We have that happen in this House every day by the government towards us. Every time we make a personal explanation to correct it, it comes back and it is done to us again. Maybe he needs to talk to his backbench about misrepresentation rather than just thinking about the ABC.

How many times do members in this House have to stand up and make personal explanations because of the way the media generally, not just the ABC—in fact, I do not think I have ever heard the ABC mentioned; but I have heard media mentioned: print media, the lot—misrepresent, misquote or quote by selection certain comments made by any one of a range of members in this very place. I thought that was a little bit precious. To be quite frank, that is not the sort of argument upon which you base legislation through which you are removing a democratically elected member of the ABC board. It is a pretty weak argument to put up, and I could not let it go without making some remarks on it.

In my view, and in the view of the Labor Party, the ABC is a significant and valuable Australian institution. It plays a vital role in our culture. It allows us to see ourselves in our own culture. Millions of Australians watch the ABC to be entertained. But many also rely on the ABC for the very diversity it provides. Many of us do not want to watch Big Brother and a lot of that other reality TV hogwash that appears through commercial channels. Thank God for the ABC—all power to it. At least it is given the right, with the proper funding and the proper governance, to produce the sort of drama that builds our industry in this country and does not destroy it. We rely on it so much for high-quality children’s programs, learning programs, great Australian drama and comedy, current affairs, world news and independent journalism. It is not at all unusual that a journalist from somewhere might have a view different to one put by somebody in this place. That does not mean bias; it means another opinion.

Kate Ellis (Adelaide, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise today to oppose the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006. On 11 October 2004 the Prime Minister gave a radio interview during which he promised to use his Senate majority sensibly. He stated:

We’re not going to allow this to go to our head. We’re not going to start proposing things that are disruptive.

We have seen time and time again this arrogant government break this promise and allow this power to go to its head. Sadly, for the electorate, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006 will do precisely this. This government is not acting sensibly at all. Ideological changes that seriously erode the independence of the ABC are callous and spiteful—anything but sensible. This is a cultural war against the ABC that has raged on for more than a decade. A 2001 committee recommendation unanimously endorsed the advice to retain the position of the staff elected director on the ABC board. The only conceivable difference now is the government’s Senate majority.

The ABC is a pillar of Australia’s system of accountable and responsible government. It has provided us with decades of independent and critical reporting that has helped keep governments honest and the public aware and informed. It has also played an important role in nurturing Australian culture and epitomising the Australian identity. The ABC keeps Australians informed and entertained. Australians value its independence, which helps produce the wide array of quality programming demanded of our national broadcasting corporation. This is why I am so alarmed that the government is planning to abolish the position of the staff elected director, the only independent director on the board of the ABC. The government is clearly aiming to abolish the position before current director Ms Ramona Koval’s term expires on 15 June 2006. It is bad enough that since 1996 the government has starved this institution of the funding it deserves. Now it is taking a swipe at the independence upheld as essential by so many Australians.

I would firstly like to discuss the value of the staff elected director. The staff elected directors at the ABC have always brought considerable experience in broadcasting to the deliberations of the board. At a time when the government is intent on cramming the board full of government cronies, it is essential that this contribution is maintained. Often, this director is the only individual on the board with the expertise to question the advice coming from the ABC’s executive. In the 74 years the ABC has existed, the government has appointed only one person with broadcasting experience. That one person was Mr Robert Raymond, a former producer for both the ABC and Channel 9. Mr Raymond served only one term.

The position of the staff appointed director has always brought a fresh perspective to the board that can only come from the staff elected position. For the past 23 years it has ensured that at least one member of the board has an extensive understanding of broadcasting, especially public broadcasting. I agree with the suggestion of the Friends of the ABC in my state of South Australia that this position provides an ‘important safeguard’. There is no evidence of abuse of this position. David Salter, a former executive producer of the ABC’s Media Watch, is right to suggest that to abolish this position would be to ‘amputate a perfectly useful limb’. Senator Coonan has wrongfully suggested that this position is an anomaly amongst Australian government agency boards. The minister needs to be clear on the term ‘anomaly’ or to stop exaggerating. The boards of the Australian National University and the Australian Film, Television and Radio School, just to name a few, all have a staff elected board position.

Why abolish this position? The answer is clearly to fulfil an ideological agenda. The excuses provided by the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts are almost laughable. The government has continued to argue that the staff elected director is subject to potential conflict because they may feel obliged to represent the interests of the people who elected them rather than to act in the best interests of the ABC. But no evidence has been produced demonstrating that any staff elected director has failed to carry out their duties. The Senate Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts Legislation Committee received submissions from several former staff elected directors of the ABC and from one of the current directors, Ms Koval. There was no evidence in any of these submissions that suggested any staff elected director had breached their obligation to act in the best interests of the ABC. To claim that because this position is staff elected the director is representative only of staff is simply ludicrous. The minority report of the committee made the obvious point:

In the case of the ABC, the staff elected director is not a representative of the staff just as directors appointed by the Government should not be representatives of the Government on the Board.

The same logic of Senator Coonan’s implication that the staff elected director would act in the interest of staff could be applied, as the South Australian Friends of the ABC suggest with more concrete evidence, to the other directors. They stated:

... the politicians who appointed the other directors might expect those directors to place the interests of their political party ahead of those of the ABC.

This government clearly has no aversion at all to a biased ABC board, as long as the bias is in its favour. In fact, the Senate committee heard a number of examples of where staff elected directors opposed proposals that would have benefited staff because they would have undermined the independence of the ABC. For instance, the proposed partnership between Telstra and the ABC was opposed by the staff elected director. This could have allowed Telstra to influence production decisions and thus undermine independence. What is more is that, even if the staff elected director does breach their duties—and we certainly have not seen that they have—they could be dismissed for misbehaviour under the current legislative arrangements.

The government has relied on the Uhrig report to condone this decision. I am afraid this is misplaced. Mr Uhrig did not specifically examine government arrangements at the ABC but rather focused upon agencies with critical business relationships, such as the ATO, the ACCC and ASIC. Mr Uhrig did not examine the governance arrangements at the ABC nor did he make inquiries of any current or previous member of the ABC board. The government has further cited evidence submitted to the committee by Professor Stephen Bartos, who is Director at the National Institute for Governance. However, Professor Bartos did not endorse the abolition of the staff elected director but rather stated it was a matter for political judgment. The fact that the government cannot even back up its own amendments with hard and fast advice is appalling. What more evidence do the Australian people need that this government is not acting sensibly at all but is again embarking on an ideological rampage? This time the ABC is in the firing line.

This is just another example of the government’s blatant attempts to diminish the independence of the ABC. The Prime Minister has consistently attempted to undermine the independence of the board since 1996. The only reason the Prime Minister seeks to abolish this position is that it is a position he cannot control. This has absolutely zero to do with corporate governance. If the government were really serious about corporate governance, it would instead install an independent process to appoint directors to the board. There must be an open and transparent process for making appointments to the ABC board. As my colleagues have mentioned, a Labor government would advertise all board vacancies and install clear, merit based selection criteria. An independent selection panel would conduct the short-list selection process, and this process would be independent of the minister. If the minister then chose not to appoint a short-listed candidate, he or she should have to table in parliament a formal statement of the reasons for departing from the short list. This would enhance Australia’s democracy by strengthening the independence of the ABC. We need to look at every possible chance to strengthen Australia’s democracy.

I would also like to state on the record my opposition to the government’s personal attacks on Ms Koval. Government members of the Senate committee questioned her integrity and in paragraphs 1.17 and 1.19 of the majority report criticised her for her failure to sign the ABC board protocol, claiming that this demonstrated a lack of independence. In Ms Koval’s defence, she had received legal advice that the protocol jeopardised her legal obligation to act independently, and this advice was not challenged before the committee. I think this must be publicly acknowledged. It is absolutely disgraceful that the government would single out Ms Koval and tarnish her reputation in pursuit of their own ideological agenda, but I suppose this is not surprising in light of the government’s history. The government have been stuffing the board full of their political buddies in an effort to undermine the independence of the ABC.

I have previously spoken in this parliament about my strong views on the ABC and my belief that a strong, independent ABC needs adequate funding. I would like to take this opportunity to comment further on the Howard government’s insistence on steadily stripping the ABC of its funding.

The 2006 budget contained some modest increases in funding, but this figure is well below both what the ABC requested and, importantly, is below the KPMG recommendation of what is necessary to sustain its current range of services. The ABC is expected to put 20 hours of Australian drama on television this year, significantly down from 102 hours five years ago. The new money will allow the ABC to produce only 28 hours of new content a year. This government has led the ABC into a state of chronic underfunding, which must, and must only, be delivered by the federal government. I will again use this opportunity to call on the government to adequately fund our ABC.

I would also like to read an excerpt from an email which was sent to me by one of my constituents. She wrote when she heard of these proposals:

I have just read that John Howard has decided to axe the elected member of the ABC staff from the Board of the ABC. I fear this is the beginning of some very bad news. Please do everything you can to stop this!

This view is not uncommon amongst the ordinary constituents in my electorate. I assure this constituent—and, indeed, all others—that I will do everything I can to stop this, including voting against this proposal today.

We have seen on so many occasions the manner in which this government is prepared to misuse its Senate power in the pursuit of attacking its so-called opponents. This legislation is an extension of this pattern. This was perhaps most obviously highlighted by the pitiful contribution of the member for Canning, where he stooped to attack one respected journalist in an effort to argue the case for this proposal. ‘What was this journalist’s crime?’ you might ask. The crime, as the member for Canning said, was that she criticised the government. In Howard’s Australia, it seems, we cannot have any of that anymore, can we? The nerve of some people—to dare to criticise this government!

The government is no stranger to using its power to attack perceived opponents or dissenting voices. We have seen it time and time again. We have seen it continually attack Australia’s trade unions and the role that they play. We have seen it attack and attempt to silence university students with its voluntary student unionism legislation, seeking to silence the student voices who quite rightly dare to speak out about the government’s continued attacks on the higher education sector. We have seen this government foster a culture of fear amongst community organisations which are reliant upon federal funding, threatening to strip them of their grants if they dare speak in opposition to Howard government policies. And, just last week, we saw one of the government’s most recent attacks on our very democracy when this chamber passed legislation to disenfranchise thousands of Australians, presumably on the basis that they may dare to oppose the government in the polls.

So whilst this government is perfecting its art form of attacking any perceived opponents, it must stop and recognise that the ABC are not enemies of the government. By doing their job—acting as a strong and independent voice reporting on current events, and educating, informing and entertaining the Australian public—they are playing a tremendous role, which must be recognised and respected by this government as it is by the Australian people.

I think it is important to fight for the ABC, because I want our children to enjoy the same quality, independent news and entertainment that everyone in this chamber has experienced. The government will obliterate the independence of the ABC if it goes ahead unchecked and that will be a very sad day for Australian democracy and for the Australian people. I oppose these measures, and I urge all members to do likewise and vote down this callous and ideologically driven drivel for what it is.

Kelly Hoare (Charlton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise tonight to speak against the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006. This is a short bill which reduces the maximum number of directors on the ABC board from nine to eight by abolishing the position of the staff elected director. The government has argued that the staff elected director is subject to a potential conflict, because they may feel obliged to represent the interests of the people who elected them rather than to act in the best interests of the ABC. Labor opposes this bill. Absolutely no evidence has been produced to demonstrate that any staff elected director has failed to comply with their duties. This legislation is simply a further attempt by the government to undermine the independence of the ABC.

In March 2006, the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Senator Coonan, announced that the government would ‘restructure’ the ABC board, and that is what we see before us today. It is just one small change, but it is a very significant change and one which will significantly impact on the independence of our ABC. That change is to abolish the only non-Howard-government appointed director of the ABC board—the staff elected director.

I will give a bit of history that shows the commitment of Labor governments to the ABC and to the independence of the ABC. In 1975, Gough Whitlam’s Labor government created the position of the staff elected director. In 1978, that position was abolished by the Liberal government under Malcolm Fraser. In 1983, the Labor government under Bob Hawke reinstated the position. In 1986, the Hawke government, under section 13A of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act, formalised the staff elected position.

Past staff elected directors have been Quentin Dempster, from June 1992 to June 1996; Kirsten Garrett, from 1996 to 2000; and Ian Henschke, from 2000 to 2002. Our current staff elected director is Ramona Koval and her term, I think, expires on 15 June, when she should have been replaced by Quentin Dempster.

The explanatory memorandum and the minister’s speech emphasise that the basis of this legislation is the Uhrig review. Indeed, the explanatory memorandum refers to pages 98 and 99 of the Uhrig review. The report of the Uhrig review was a document of 133 pages; only two of those pages alluded to representational appointments to governing boards. The Friends of the ABC’s submission to the Senate inquiry said:

The Bill appears to rely heavily on findings contained within the Uhrig Review of June, 2003.

The Friends of the ABC submitted that the Uhrig review focused on taxation, regulation and provision of services. In all of its 133 pages, the Uhrig review made no reference to the ABC or any of the other organisations that had representational appointments to their boards. It is a fairly damning indictment of the government and the minister that they have based this legislative change to the board of the ABC on a review which does not mention the ABC once.

The Uhrig review was established by the Prime Minister in 2002. The terms of reference were to review governance practices of statutory authorities and office holders, particularly those agencies which impact on the business community. I do not know about you, Mr Deputy Speaker, but I do not see the ABC as a statutory authority or an agency having as much impact on the business community as many other government boards or authorities. The Uhrig report dealt briefly with representational appointments, as I mentioned before. According to the Bills Digest:

The review did not consider staff elected representation specifically except a brief consideration of departmental public servants sitting on boards of other government agencies.

Apparently the ABC is not the only Commonwealth authority or company that has a staff elected board member. Other organisations include the Australian National University, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare and the Australian Film Television and Radio School. We have not seen the government move to eliminate or abolish the staff elected representatives on those boards, but I suppose that will come.

There has been debate today about a supposed conflict of interest—whether or not a staff elected representative on the board would put the interests of the ABC and the independence of the ABC before the interests of the staff who elected that particular director. In my mind, those interests coincide and would not conflict at all. I understand that there is a section of the act which deals with the elected director’s participation or non-participation in any discussion which relates to the conditions and pay of ABC staff.

On 24 March 2006, the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts, Helen Coonan, said that there is a clear legal requirement of the staff elected director that means that he or she has the same rights, duties and obligations as other directors, including to act in the interests of the ABC as a whole. That is covered in section 8 of the act. If a staff elected director of the ABC was in breach of this part of the legislation, that director would be removed from the ABC board. That has not happened over the past decades when we have had a staff elected representative. If it did happen, there is a clear legal avenue for the government or the rest of the board to rectify that situation. But it has not happened and I would not anticipate that it would happen. As I said, staff representatives have a legal duty the same as that of other board members. It is not to their constituents but to the organisation more generally. These are set out in section 8 of the ABC Act, as I said.

The Bills Digest also said that it is worth noting that if there is a concern that staff elected board members might prosecute particular interests, that must equally apply to other board members who are appointed by the government. And, of course, they are in the majority. There is only one staff elected board member, as opposed to up to seven or eight appointed by the government. Of course, they would have their personal interests at heart as well.

There is also a moral duty. The staff elected director at the ABC board brings with him or her a wide range of experience in journalism and broadcasting. That is not necessarily the case with the government appointed directors. The staff appointed director is able to advise the board on a professional basis in the areas of journalism and broadcasting. They bring that whole depth of experience with them. That is the reason they are nominated and selected by the staff of the ABC.

We have heard that the Senate Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts Legislation Committee had an inquiry into this. The inquiry was held in a period when there were five non-sitting weeks, and the government deemed that the inquiry would last for one day. It was a very short inquiry. There ended up being a minority report by Labor and the minority parties who did not believe that the evidence that was provided to them warranted a change of this significance.

I want to talk about the submission by the current staff elected director, Ramona Koval. Her submission to the inquiry included the statement:

Generally, there is an expectation that members of a Board of Directors will act collectively ... However, this is subject to the overriding duty of each individual member of the Board to act in good faith in the Corporation’s best interests.

That was when she had been criticised for some actions or decisions that she had taken as a director of the board, but she had done them on the basis of sound principles, values and good governance. Ms Koval talked about the criticism of her when she would not sign a particular document. She said:

One version of the document required that I not participate in “public (including media) discussions, interviews or articles relating to ABC Board matters”. This could imply that as a Director I cannot comment in public on any matter to do with the ABC at all, as a Board matter is really anything to do with an organisation.

Here is a document that is going to gag members of the ABC board, who are directed with running and governing the ABC, so they cannot discuss publicly anything about the ABC. It is quite extraordinary. I agree that she was quite within her rights to refuse to sign that particular document, and of course, as we have seen, she has been criticised widely for it.

Another staff representative on the ABC board from 1996 to 2000, Kirsten Garrett, said in relation to this legislation:

This is just red raw politics with an extraordinary disregard for the Australian people. If it succeeds, the Government will have complete control of the ABC.

We have heard many discussions since July last year of Howard’s extravagance since he has gained control of the Senate, and this is just another ideological push on his part of his personal responsibility, as he sees it, to destroy our independent broadcaster. Now that he has control of the Senate, he will have control of the ABC.

Our ABC is not only under attack in this legislation; it is also under attack in this year’s budget. In the 2006-07 budget just brought down this month, the ABC received $88.2 million over three years for drama and documentary making, regional and local programming and capital renewal. This is not enough to sustain programming needs, and it is substantially less than the ABC’s budget submission log of claims. Speaking on the budget, the Friends of the ABC spokesperson—and I need to declare a vested interest here: I am a member of the Friends of the ABC—Margaret O’Connor described the ABC’s funding situation as ‘grim’ and ‘dire’ and forecast that the ABC is facing significant programming cuts.

In their last annual report, the board of directors said that ‘a critical point has been reached’ and that unless ‘adequate funding is secured for the coming triennium, the Board will be faced with a range of fundamental questions about the extent and quality of ABC programming and services’.

Further, the government commissioned KPMG to investigate the ABC’s funding. The government will not release this report and has been withholding it from the parliament and from the public. This is something that taxpayers have paid for. It is a review into the funding of our ABC—the ABC that belongs to each and every Australian—and now the government is hiding it. There must be something in this KPMG report that the government does not like, and it will not release it to the general public.

I would also like to quote from a letter to the Australian Financial Review of 15 May by Judith Rodriguez, who is a Friend of the ABC in Melbourne. She writes:

While funding to the ABC was increased, the broadcaster received less than it needs to maintain its existing level of service. The additional funds come with strings attached that undermine the ABC’s independence.

The ABC budget appropriation is $37.6 million short of the amount that leaked from a government-commissioned report revealing ABC needs for the next three years.

She concludes:

The community values the ABC because it knows the public broadcaster is not compromised by government or commercial influence.

Undermine the ABC’s independence, and there will be no reason for the ABC to exist.

It looks like this is precisely what the government is seeking to do.

The community will need to be vigilant if the ABC is to survive in more than name.

Well done Judith Rodriguez, and there are so many more people like her who are Friends of the ABC and who will continue to stand up for the independence of the ABC.

In conclusion, I would like to quote from a recent newsletter from the Friends of the ABC in New South Wales. We have a very active branch in Newcastle of which I am very proud to be a member. A boxed article at the bottom of page 3 entitled ‘DID YOU KNOW?’ says:

Friends of the ABC (NSW) celebrates the 30th anniversary of its founding in April. It was formed in protest at funding cuts (familiar?) imposed by the Fraser Government. Here we are thirty years later with many of the same issues existing in 1976 and some additional ones to challenge us.

Sharon Bird (Cunningham, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Tonight I rise to speak in opposition to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006. Like my colleague, I wish to be up-front in acknowledging that I am also a member of the New South Wales, and specifically the Illawarra branch, Friends of the ABC and that approximately 80 per cent of my scarce viewing and listening time is spent enjoying the excellent programs offered by ABC television and radio.

I joined the Friends of the ABC a number of years ago as I grew concerned by the concerted and, indeed, borderline paranoid attacks on the independence of the ABC by the former Minister Alston. I note that this legacy has been taken up in the other place with gusto, particularly by the newly elected Senator Fierravanti-Wells.

Like the majority of Australians, I believe the ABC in its various broadcast forms provides the most informative and unbiased reporting in Australia on current and world affairs. I also appreciate the range and breadth of the journalistic opinion which is on offer. Unlike some on the other side of the House, I do understand that opinion, when offered, should not misrepresent itself as news. In my experience, the ABC is far more rigorous in making this distinction clear in its programs than is often the case in the commercial media.

I acknowledge that the ABC, like some of the individual journalists and reporters in the commercial field, can give governments—and, indeed, oppositions—a torrid time in pushing and questioning their actions and explanations. They certainly did when Labor was in federal government. We copped it most times. Sometimes we argued with the ABC about it, but we did not undervalue the democratic importance of its role and did not seek to starve or bully it into submission, as has been occurring under this government over the last 10 years.

The minister claims that this legislation is necessary because the ABC staff elected director position is an anomaly in corporate governance. To the contrary, such positions are not at all unusual on many boards that govern other types of organisations such as tertiary and cultural institutions—for example, the University of Wollongong in my own electorate—and health systems. Indeed, some more progressive private enterprises and businesses that value the corporate knowledge and shop floor experience of their own staff also make provision for a staff elected director position. Even multinationals, I understand, such as Mercedes Benz do this. There are certainly extensive examples of boards that are too insular to have protected the organisation they oversight, and there are many cases where this has led to corporate collapses or public scandals. Surely it is only good governance to seek a broader gene pool of talent to draw from, rather than to minimise it and fall into the trap of cloning existing board members. Indeed, the current scandal with AWB shows that boards can only benefit from wider gene pools, particularly one that delivers some independent and critical thinking.

Former staff elected director Quentin Dempster has outlined circumstances in which past staff elected directors have been critical players in identifying problems with board considerations that have resulted in avoiding significant loss or embarrassment. In interview, Mr Dempster referred to the role of the staff elected board director in the creation of the board ordered inquiry into the breaches of the ABC Act and the ABC board editorial policies through ‘backdoor sponsorship’ of television infotainment programs by vested interests. He further outlined the role of staff elected directors acting to protect the ABC’s independence in policy and operational terms in opposing the failed proposals for commercial partnerships with John Fairfax Holdings Pty Ltd and Cox Communications of the United States in subscription or pay television and with Telstra in broadband content with access to all ABC content.

The government argues that a staff elected director carries an inherent conflict of interest between their directorial responsibilities and some form of constituency responsibilities arising from being elected. The government does not provide—and I believe has not successfully provided—an argument about why a director who is elected is more bound to their electors than a director who is appointed is bound to their appointee. All directors are bound by the ABC Act’s clauses covering duties of directors, pecuniary interests and removal, regardless of the method of their elevation to the board. Mr Dempster outlined the case that in the backdoor sponsorship issue the staff elected director’s actions were contrary to any narrow sectional interests of journalists, producers and support staff, as it resulted in infotainment being taken off air and, again in the pay TV case, 100 jobs being lost.

In trying to make the argument for this amendment based on the Uhrig report of 2003, the government is ignoring the fact, as has been identified by other speakers on this side, that the report deals with the types of boards and circumstances that are not identical to the staff elected director of the ABC board nor to the functions of the board. The report by and large referred to taxation regulation and provision of services and failed to make any reference in its 133 pages to the ABC board, its membership or circumstances.

In reality, most government members have risen in this House and in the other place to claim that they really value the ABC and that this amendment is about good corporate governance, not about attacking the ABC. Strangely and almost without exception, they then proceed to attack various presenters, journalists or shows. As an example, I particularly refer to the speech delivered on this bill by Wollongong based Senator Fierravanti-Wells, who listed a string of complaints against the broadcaster in her newly appointed Alston successor role. The senator seems to feel that the ABC should censor the range of views and opinions that can be presented on their news and current affairs coverage and that, if the range of people she identified as inappropriate are allowed to appear, the ABC should act as an alternative voice and debate the issue. This is a profound misunderstanding of the role of effective journalism. Certainly a good journalist should push for an interviewee to be accountable for their views and actions, but this is far from being an alternative voice.

The senator then goes on to tell the ABC what question it should have asked the former ALP leader Mark Latham. Personally I think the media did a good job with a pretty willing participant to dump buckets on the ALP, but this was not enough for the senator. She launched an attack on the ABC journalist for not asking one question which she feels was crucial. If this is giving her so much angst, perhaps she should have considered a career change to journalism rather than to the Senate. But this is a distinction that government members seem incapable of comprehending in this debate.

Those on the other side of the House have no problem with the commercial media running many of the same stories as the ABC, reporting many of the same events, providing air time and columns to the same characters, asking or failing to ask the same questions or using or failing to use particular terms and references—so why the special criticism of the ABC? The answer to this question lies at the heart of this bill. Government members believe the government should own the ABC body and soul. They should be director, editor, producer and reporter. They should be judge and jury of every story. The senator concludes her contribution by claiming that the ABC is actually under threat by ‘the pernicious left-wing influence that permeates far too much of the ABC’s biased and unbalanced coverage’. This bill is certainly about the independence of the ABC. This bill is about the real problems this government has with the very independence that the ABC maintains, despite attempts over the last 10 years to starve it into submission.

John Murphy (Lowe, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Following the announcement in March 2006 by the Minister for Communications, Information Technology and the Arts concerning her plans to restructure the board of the ABC, many held hopes of legitimate reform. It would not be naive to assume that many supporters of the ABC believed the minister’s statement to imply that the government was making a belated yet genuine attempt to ensure that the ABC’s corporate governance arrangements reflected community demands for a vibrant and independent national broadcaster. Such a restructure ought to have provided greater scrutiny of board appointments while restraining the practice of the government to stack the board with its political mates. Tragically, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006 achieves neither of these laudable objectives.

Before voicing my stern opposition to this bill, it would be instructive to analyse what it does not do. The bill has failed to implement an open and transparent process for making government appointments to the ABC board. Given the minister’s apparent intention that the bill ensure that all board members act in the best interests of the ABC rather than in the interests of those who have put them on the board, it is inconceivable that she could have any objection to a process that would advertise all board vacancies and ensure that any selection is based on merit rather than on the basis of political patronage.

It is no stretch of the imagination to suggest that this government has been unjustifiably sensitive to the ABC’s overt independence and has responded in kind by catapulting onto the board people with whom it has networked or who are close to it. One only need look to recent appointments, including Michael Kroger and Ron Brunton, to realise that the government is doing all it can to reel in what it considers to be an unruly child. It is clear that the government would prefer the ABC to be biased—but biased in favour of its ideology and philosophy.

If the government were serious about resolving the so-called tension between the obligation of directors to act in the best interests of the public broadcaster and their obligation to serve the interests of those who elected them to their positions, it would have provided a framework for board appointments to be made objectively. For years, Labor has been calling for a truly independent selection panel to undertake a short-list selection process for board appointments. This short list would be independent of any minister and would limit the circumstances in which political stooges could be appointed to the board. That there should be clear merit based selection criteria is something that all ABC supporters can agree on. That such a proposal has not been adopted by the government demonstrates that the intent of this bill is not, as the minister suggests, ‘to improve the ABC’s corporate governance’.

The question must then be asked: what exactly does this bill restructure? The minister’s restructure consists of just one measure: a proposal to abolish the position of staff elected representative on the ABC board. It is no coincidence that the staff elected position has been targeted for termination. It is the one appointment to the board of the ABC that the government cannot control. Despite the protestations of the minister, this bill has nothing to do with improving corporate governance whatsoever but is just the latest instalment in this government’s epic battle to undermine the independence of the ABC. Naturally, the minister denies this and refers to section 78(6) of the ABC Act, which states:

... the Corporation is not subject to direction by or on behalf of the Government of the Commonwealth.

This is a disingenuous attempt to employ shallow words to give soothing assurances that the ABC has and always will be independent while underhandedly destroying the few structures in place that give effect to such words. Recent events demonstrate that words are insufficient to protect the ABC’s independence. In spite of section 78(6) of the ABC Act, I note a report by Louise Dobson in the Sydney Morning Herald of 9 May this year. That report suggests that the ABC board had short-listed an individual to take over the role of managing director and run it past the government only to be told to try again.

Indeed, in recent days, as we now know, Mark Scott—a former chief political adviser to the Liberal state education minister, Terry Metherell—has been announced as the ABC’s new managing director. Is it a coincidence that, according to reports in the Sydney Morning Herald of 22 May this year, Mr Scott is said to be on good terms with the minister for communications? With the abolition of the staff elected position, one wonders whether this will be the only way to be elected to the ABC board of directors—that is, by being on good terms with the minister. So much for the section 78(6) requirement of being ‘not subject to direction by or on behalf of the government’.

The few structures in place that promote independence, including the staff elected representative position, are needed now more than ever. Our national broadcaster is at the crossroads. The government has made a decision on the ABC’s funding, which is not enough to sustain basic programming needs and is substantially less than that recommended by an independent report by KPMG. The board has just announced its new managing director who will be instrumental in determining the ABC’s long-term direction, including whether advertising will be permitted on our national broadcaster. That should be of grave concern to all of us. I draw the minister’s attention to my letter published in today’s Financial Review on that very topic.

There exists now more than ever a need for a director who better understands and is entirely committed to the ABC’s charter to inform, educate, entertain and enhance a sense of national identity. Moves to commercially exploit the ABC, which have not been ruled out by Mr Scott, will be much harder to resist without a staff elected director to act as a charter safeguard. There exists now more than ever a need for a director who better understands the unique nature of the ABC. Most private companies would envy the passion and loyalty that characterise the relationship of staff elected directors with the ABC; the government begrudges it.

Perhaps the government understands only too well the inexorable nexus between the interests of the ABC and the passion and loyalty held by many members of its staff. In light of the government’s devastating funding arrangements and mooted desire to permit advertising on the public broadcaster, it makes sense for the government to eradicate the largest stumbling block to alleviating the pain in its hip pocket. Indeed, the minister has expressed an interest in allowing the ABC to become a rating-chasing, revenue-raising body at the expense of diversity in children’s, religious, science, health, music, drama, documentary, comedy, news and current affairs programming. There can be no doubt that the staff elected director, who is the only board member with the expertise to cross-examine advice coming from the ABC executive, is a monumental thorn in the side of the Howard government. Professor Ken Inglis, a leading authority on the organisation, has stated that the:

... staff elected director has exercised more influence ... than any other single director, apart from the chairman and deputy chair.

In light of the government’s plans for the ABC, is it any wonder that it seeks to destroy this position? Putting aside the government’s clandestine intention, Senator Coonan, the communications minister, has also failed to bring forward evidence that supports the public position taken by the government in respect of this bill. The minister’s explanatory memorandum to the bill quotes a report of June 2003 by John Uhrig, entitled Review of the corporate governance of statutory authorities and office holders. Relevantly, the minister’s explanatory memorandum quotes the Uhrig report’s conclusion:

The Review does not support representational appointments to governing boards as representational appointments can fail to produce independent and objective views. There is the potential for these appointments to be primarily concerned with the interests of those they represent, rather than the success of the entity they are responsible for governing.

At face value, this statement provides compelling evidence in favour of the abolition of the staff elected director position. The minister has spoken publicly of a concern that staff elected directors could feel obliged to represent the interests of the staff who elected them rather than to act in the best interests of the ABC. An inquiry into the bill by the Senate Environment, Communications, Information Technology and the Arts Legislation Committee proves this to be anything but the case. Indeed, the Senate committee has heard numerous examples of where a staff elected director has opposed measures that may have benefited staff but which have jeopardised the independence of the ABC. This is perhaps best seen with a staff elected director’s exposure of backdoor sponsorship infotainment programs on ABC TV in the 1990s in breach of the ABC Act.

It is hypocritical in the extreme for the government to be casting aspersions on staff elected directors when it has failed to accept or even acknowledge that members of the board appointed by the government have a far greater potential for conflict of interest than has been shown to exist for any director that staff have elected to the position. It clearly does not suit the government to acknowledge the passion and loyalty that characterises the relationship of staff elected directors with the ABC. Doing so would bring into question the passion, loyalty and bona fides held by those appointed by the government itself. Nevertheless, assuming Uhrig’s conclusions, referred to in the explanatory memorandum, are true, it is interesting to note that his findings on this matter only made up one page of a 133-page report. Furthermore, Mr Uhrig made no reference to the ABC anywhere in his report. It is also interesting that Mr Uhrig’s comment that ‘there are no universally accepted structures and practices that constitute good governance’ did not find its way into the minister’s explanatory memorandum. I ask why.

It would be pertinent to note the comments of another expert in governance at this point. Professor Stephen Bartos, Director of the National Institute for Governance, has stated that the choice of governance model to be adopted for a public sector body should not be formulaic but should be driven by the objectives of the organisation concerned. Clearly, should the Howard government see the ABC as operating in a similar manner to other commercial television and radio stations, a governance structure espoused by Uhrig may be justified. However, if we are to continue to conceive of the ABC as being a different sort of body—a community based body which is not interested in rising ratings and raising revenue—having representative directors onboard is entirely appropriate.

If the government is serious about fostering the independent spirit which resides within the ABC, it must maintain the only position over which it has no control: the staff elected director. The staff elected director is the one voice which has exposed past board attempts to tie the ABC to commercial arrangements which would corrupt its public purpose. It is the one voice that has done most to protect the integrity of the ABC charter. It is the one voice that can exercise genuine independence in all board decisions. And it has done that with distinction when we were in government.

Given the absence of merit based selection criteria for board appointments made by the government, the staff elected director also brings much needed practical broadcasting experience and insight into the boardroom discussion of policy and operational procedures. Given the board selection process, such experience and insight may otherwise have been missing from boardroom discussions. There has long been a concern that the government has made no effort to select board members with an appropriate mix of skills for running a national broadcaster. Indeed, similar concerns were raised by a highly unlikely source: former Senator Richard Alston, as Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on ABC Management and Operations. He said, inter alia:

The current ABC is required to make decisions with long-term implications in a time of overwhelmingly rapid transformation of broadcasting technology. The board’s task may have been made more difficult by the fact that many of its members have little specialist knowledge of either the broadcasting industry or the new technologies. The committee believes that the board as a whole lacks the range of depth of skills and experience which would be necessary to provide adequate leadership for the ABC.

The staff elected director has this specialist knowledge of the ABC and the broadcasting industry. The staff elected director has the range of skills and experience which is necessary to provide leadership of the ABC. What the staff elected director does not have is the capacity to succumb to this government’s extreme and destructive plans for the ABC.

The staff elected director position has served the ABC well. Far from deserving to be abolished, the position ought to be retained in the ABC’s governance structure. I congratulate Mr Quentin Dempster on his election again to the board because he, more than anyone, has been an ornament to the public broadcaster. I do not think anyone in this House would quarrel with the integrity of Mr Quentin Dempster.

A vote for this bill is almost certainly a vote for the commercial exploitation and political manipulation of the ABC, given the ease with which it can occur without the watchful eye of a staff elected director. As taxpayers and viewers, we deserve to see our public broadcaster better protected against such manipulation and coercion. To make this bill into law would fail Australia’s most important national institution as well as the millions of Australians who rely on the ABC for news, information, entertainment and education.

For as long as I remain a member of this parliament, you can be sure that I will continue to fight against this government’s vitriolic and unjustified attacks on our public broadcaster. I encourage any true supporters of the ABC who are sitting on the other side of this chamber to do the same. I reject this nonsense that is always thrown at the ABC about its so-called bias. I well remember Neville Wran, Bob Hawke and Paul Keating complaining about the ABC. Of course, any government will complain when the public broadcaster runs an editorial contrary to a policy position of the government of the day, whether it be federal or state. So the politicisation of the ABC continues.

The government are prepared to allow the ABC to raise its revenue to supplement its budget. We all know that, apart from the concerns that we all have with regard to compromising the independence of the ABC, once the government rely on revenue being drawn from the corporate sector, the government will take that amount of money out of their budget for the ABC. So it will be a neutral position; the ABC will not gain anything. Moreover, I think this is quite a serious matter at a time when the government are about to change our media ownership laws and hand over our democracy to Mr Packer and Mr Murdoch. That should be of great concern to all of us. I call on all members of this House, in particular the members of the government, to come to their senses, support the independence of the ABC and support Mr Quentin Dempster in his campaign. I reject this bill. (Time expired)

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Amendment Bill 2006. I personally have suffered greatly at the hands of the ABC. In finding what was called the ‘crooked creek cattle company’ in North Queensland, some 18 people gave evidence about it. Of those 18, six were dead within two or three years and the remaining 12 were put up on trumped up charges of one type or another. The Queensland Commissioner of Police and I were included in the 18 and, at that stage, I was a senior minister in the government. It was the very courageous actions of Steve Austin, an ABC journalist who has covered the Drive show in recent years, who exposed the situation.

For reasons that I do not entirely understand, it has been the tradition and culture of the ABC to show great courage at times and to do things that are very important for Australia. For those who have read the story of Kokoda, Chester Wilmot exposed what was going on at Kokoda and received terrible treatment by the Australian government and the Army. The militia battalions saved Australia on the Kokoda trail. Chester Wilmot had all of his reporting confiscated by the Army and the government of the day. But it was not the fault of Chester Wilmot or the ABC. They made strenuous efforts to try to protect Australia.

One of the reasons given by the government is that this sort of thing is normal in a corporation. But the government is not running a corporation; it is running a country. It is assessing the values of such a system to the country if the country requires a free and unfettered media. In one article I read recently, two corporations—Woolworths and Coles—are responsible for 27c of every Australian dollar spent. If we eliminated the ABC, we could save the trouble of having an election. We could just ring up Coles and Woolworths and let them decide who they want to appoint as Prime Minister of Australia, because their powers would be so great and excessive.

Debate interrupted.