APC Update | Issue 36
APC UPDATE
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| APC UPDATE | 11 August 2014 |
| Statement by the Executive Director |
| The Weekend Australian newspaper has made a number of assertions about the Press Council and its Chair (Professor Julian Disney) in relation to a complaint which is currently being considered by its Adjudication Panel. They included an assertion that the Chair should stand down from further consideration of the matter. |
| The newspaper concedes that it has breached the confidentiality obligations relating to its discussions with the complainant and the Panel. These obligations are essential to protect the interests of both the complainant and the publication in the fairness and integrity of the process. Their breach in any particular case adversely affects the confidence with which all other complainants and publications can engage in the Council’s processes. |
| The obligations encourage candid and constructive discussion and avoid discussions with the Panel becoming vehicles for public airing of irrelevant or needlessly offensive assertions. It also means, for example, that details of a complaint are not made public until the same time as the Panel’s findings are made public in its adjudication. Sometimes, the public adjudication may exclude all reference to an aspect which the Panel decides is unfounded. |
| The Council must not aggravate the newspaper’s breach of confidentiality by now disclosing details of the discussion in order to refute assertions about the way in which it was conducted. But this does not mean, of course, that the assertions are accepted. It should be emphasised, however, that referrals of complaints for consideration by the Panel are made by the Executive Director, not the Panel itself, and do not necessarily mean that he or she considers they should be upheld. |
| The newspaper has suggested the Chair should have disclosed a conflict of interest due to possible contacts with the late Senator Arthur Gietzelt who was the subject of the material to which the complaint related. The Chair has reiterated what he told the newspaper before it published the article: |
| “The only possible contact of which I am aware is that Sen Gietzelt apparently spoke at a public meeting in 1988 at which I was also an invited speaker. If there was any contact between us it would only have been for the purpose of being introduced to each other. The newspaper conjectured that other contacts might have occurred more than twenty to thirty years ago when I was President of ACOSS and a member of government advisory committees. So far as I am aware no contacts of that or any other kind occurred at any time.” |
| The Panel for this complaint comprised four members in addition to the Chair (two members from a media background and two public members). As is usual, both the complainant and the newspaper will have an opportunity to seek review of the Panel’s provisional conclusions before they are finalised and published. There is also an opportunity to request review by a different panel of the Council before any adjudication is published. |
| Finally, the newspaper incorrectly claimed that early last year the Chair withdrew from the Panel to consider a complaint only after it had approached him. That assertion was promptly corrected at the time by the then Executive Director, who pointed out that the Chair had clearly stated several weeks earlier that if a Panel was established he would not be on it. |
| John Pender, Executive Director |
| Australian Press Council Address: Level 6, 309 Kent St, Sydney, 2000 Phone: (02) 9261 1930 or 1800 025 712 Fax: (02) 9267 6826 Email: info@presscouncil.org.au Web: http://www.presscouncil.org.au |
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