Peter Costigan

Peter, our friend and colleague, passed away on the 5 August 2002. He was just one month shy of his twentieth anniversary as a member of the Australian Press Council.

Peter had an innate curiosity about who, and what, was around him. He was a born journalist. He once told me that he had never met a boring person. He believed each individual had a story to tell, and he gave that individual the opportunity to be heard. From his early days as an industrial reporter with the Melbourne Herald, he rose to motoring editor and chief features writer. Peter went on to become HWT's correspondent in New York and Washington from 1966-1976. He was a recorder of historical events, whose wealth of stories included being a witness to our learned former Prime Minister Gough Whitlam giving then-President Richard Nixon chapter and verse on Oval Office artwork.

Back in Canberra, Peter was twice to win the National Press Club Award for political journalism and served four terms as President of the Press Gallery, both indications of the high regard, as a writer and as a person, with which he was held by his colleagues.

Peter was a strong supporter of self-regulation of the press. He was a clear and analytical thinker, who had a real knack of stressing major points of principle which needed to be considered. He was first elected, by his peers in the AJA, to represent journalists on the Council, in 1982, and re-elected in 1985. When the AJA withdrew in 1986, Peter stayed on (together with another elected journalist member, Pat Burgess.) As a freelance journalist and commentator from 1987, he owed no allegiance to any proprietor and presented a fiercely independent voice on the Council. He offered the Press Council his vast experience as a journalist and as a proponent of journalistic ethics. Successive Chairs of the Council invited Peter to serve further terms. Like everyone else, we were surprised when Peter was elected the Lord Mayor of Melbourne in 2000. "Our Peter!" David McNicoll bellowed over the 'phone to me with delight when I told him the news. There was some debate on the Council as to whether a serving Lord Mayor could be the sort of independent voice required on the Council. The Council voted overwhelmingly to endorse Peter's continued membership.

One of the main reasons Peter was so well-liked was that he was such good company. The obituary in The Australian summed it up best when Brian Buckley wrote of Peter's "versatility in telling a good story and for being in the right place as events unfolded, possessing the ability to consume liquor and his invincible congeniality". An editor friend on the Press Council put it this way, "An adornment to our profession and a decent bloke, to boot".

Peter was farewelled at St Patrick's Cathedral, East Melbourne. It was a fitting celebration of a well-lived life. Peter would have loved the final touch: during the recessional, they sang "Good Old Collingwood Forever" one last time for him.

Deborah Kirkman

[An interview with Peter Costigan was published in the May 1998 Australian Press Council News.]

[ return to top ]

Return to APC News 2002 Index

Documents with the icon require the Acrobat Reader, a Free Utility from Adobe. Click here for more information.