General Press Release No. 238 (April 2000)

Senate Report: In the Public Interest

The Australian Press Council has received a copy of the Report of the Senate Select Committee on Information Technologies entitled In the Public Interest : Monitoring Australia's Media.

It is a very silly report in that it proposes that public monies be spent on a problem that does not exist.

The report proposes the establishment, at the taxpayers' expense, of a Media Complaints Commission to oversight the handling of complaints against the media, yet it makes no case for the need for such a body.

The argument for the inadequacy of the existing complaints mechanism dealing with the print media is based on two examples, one of which involved a politician. The Press Council handles many hundreds of complaints each year. Both examples were concerned with the republication of photographs that had been the subject of an adverse finding by the Council. Despite the Committee's criticism of the Council in relation to these instances, its proposed public-funded Commission would not have been able to prevent the same action occurring.

The Committee refers to no public representations to it for the establishment of the body that it proposes, let alone that public monies should be spent to support it.

The evidence cited to attack the Council is from well-known critics who desire a licensed media and from academics and journalists who have no current knowledge of the working of the Council. The Committee also relies on its perception of the operation of the UK Press Complaints Commission to draw comparisons with the Australian Press Council. No-one with any knowledge of the British media could argue that its complaints commission has ensured that the privacy of individuals and the accuracy of reporting is better protected there than here!

The report is heavy in its support for media control. This, of course, is attractive to many politicians as it enables avoidance of public attention relating to their affairs. However, the report pays scant attention to that most fundamental of principle: that a free society only exists where there is a free press.

see also
Submission to the Senate Select Committee on Information Technologies
Supplementary submission to the Senate Select Committee on Information Technologies
Second supplementary submission to the Senate Select Committee on Information Technologies

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