Complaints not adjudicated: 2007-2008

In the comlaints statistics for 2007-2008, this report noted a small percentage of complaints progressed through the complaints procedures (published in the Council's information booklet, Objects, Principles and Complaints Procedure, available from the office and posted on the Council's website at: http://www.presscouncil.org,au/pcsite/complaints/process.html) to the adjudication stage in 2007-2008. In 2007-2008, this figure was 16.6 per cent. This figure can be compared with previous years, in the table on page 46 of this report. Of the remaining complaints, some were refused, some referred to another body and others withdrawn for legal action. Details of the number and percentage in each category can be found in the table on "Complaints were disposed by" on page 49. 8.4 per cent of complainants did not follow-up a request from the Secretariat for more detail on their complaints. And then there are those complainants who were happy to let their complaint rest after receiving the publication's response to the complaint and those whose complaints were conciliated either by the Council Secretariat or by a Public Member of the Council. 45.3 per cent of all complaints ended in this way - to the satisfaction of all parties.

The complaints process gives the Executive Secretary a discretion to refuse a complaint in a number of circumstances. Previous annual reports have discussed many of these, and readers are directed to the Council's website, where earlier reports on "Complaints not Adjudicated" are archived (http://www.presscouncil.org.au/pcsite/complaints/notadj.html). The most important of these relates to 'third party' complaints. The Council has decided that:

The Executive Secretary will, as a rule, reject as complaints, matters from disinterested parties:

• which raise matters likely to lead to the further invasion of the privacy of those reported on;
   
• which appear to the Executive Secretary to raise largely trivial or frivolous concerns; or
   
• which do not raise a significant breach of the principles.

Complainants who feel aggrieved about the rejection of their complaint can appeal the Executive Secretary's decision to the Council's Complaints Committee, which decides whether to accept the matter for processing. In exceptionally rare circumstances, publications can appeal the acceptance of what they see as an unfair complaint.

The Executive Secretary has also been given a discretion by the Council to actively pursue publications seeking action from them that might satisfy a complainant. In cases where it seems to the Executive Secretary that such action is not only warranted, but called for in the circumstances, the Council has asked him to be more direct in such requests to publications.

The figures on page 46 demonstrate that publications are nowadays far more ready to offer settlements in a greater number of cases. These settlements, and those agreed to during conciliations of complaints, are the often unreported successes of the Council's complaints process.

Conciliated complaints

A number of the complainants conciliated successfully by the secretariat, or by an independent member of the Council, and the sorts of settlements arrived at, are outlined in each edition of the APC News, and these are published on the Council's website.

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View the details of complaints not adjudicated for each of the following years:

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