ABC political editor Andrew Probyn has been sacked as part of a new five-year plan. Editor-in-Chief Michelle Pini takes a look at what this means for the public broadcaster.
ANDREW PROBYN has been dropped from his role as political editor at the ABC.
This is not in defense of Probyn, who, as a political editor, should have had someone edit his own privilege-laden, often blatantly biased commentary before it was released for public consumption.
Also, let’s not start with the standard of Probyn’s recent questioning of people like the former prime minister Paul Keatingfor example, that it was, at best, devoid of any substance or vision.
And no, we don’t think Probyn has been let go, like Nick Cater suggested in an apparently non-satirical piece for The Australian (where else?), because he was white and male!
Since Probyn was fired rather than replaced, the issue here isn’t about him, specifically, but about Auntie’s management. And it seems that political news coverage on the national broadcaster no longer warrants a political editor, at all.
Probyn was one 120 workers – including 41 members of the news staff – to be dismissed as part of:
“…A series of savings measures and reinvestment initiatives designed to address rising costs and support its transition to a digital media organization.”
Whatever that means.
According to the CEO of ABC David Anderson:
“We have made clear our vision for the ABC to be an essential part of everyday life for all Australians through our high-quality journalism and content, wherever they live across the country.”
That claim may be particularly hard to swallow given the ABC’s “high-quality journalism and content” currently on offer, ahead of this latest move to ditch it even more and leave us all still less informed
Insiders, for example, is now little more than a publicly funded catch-up between white, male, extremely right-leaning friends (most of the time), who are regularly given another platform to air their every increasingly disconnected. opinions After all, they are not called “insiders” for nothing!
Breakfast news now it looks like a less polished version of Sunrise. There are recipes, updates of what taylor swift is up for grabs, ‘news’ delivered via repeated News Corp/Nine headlines and a host of ‘high impact’ stories such as this morning’s characteristic about the disappearance of Fantales lollipops. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, of course, but where’s the foreign affairs coverage? Regional coverage? The analysis of the problems?
And if you still need proof of the sad, broken state of our public broadcaster, trumping all of the above in a mind-blowing speech, there’s a Q&A.
This week, the program featured the National Senator Bridget McKenzie, whose pointless comment he makes Island of love the contestants look like a collection of canteen minds Apparently, Bridget “Sport Rorts” McKenzie is now an ABC A-lister, given that she also guest-starred on Insiders the other day, where she was given a platform to justify Senator Gallagher’s witch-hunt.
His own party’s mishandling of the Brittany Higgins allegations or the recent allegations against the Liberal Party senator, David Vaneverything was fine, though.
This is apparently because McKenzie declared that Gallagher’s relentless questioning was “legitimate” and since, according to the host David Speers, the theme “was armed by Labor in 2021″! Oh, also,”Peter Dutton took swift and decisive action’ against Van, so we should all move on.
But let’s get back to Q&A on Monday (June 19).
McKenzie was offended by the comedian Ruben KayeNext joke first shared to the project:
“I love Jesus. I love any man who can get nailed three days in a row and come back for more.”
When asked why he found it so offensive, McKenzie said:
“You know, I’m a person of faith. And it wasn’t just the Christian community that took offense. The Islamic community did too. Although, I guess … Christians have been persecuted for over 2,000 years.”
IDK can say Bridget McKenzie I just lost my mind on this. Totally weird 😩#BloodA #Auspol pic.twitter.com/zV36fC57F2
— Jules The Red 🐀 (@RedJules4) June 19, 2023
To which Kaye jokingly said:
“Oh, give it a break! You’re standing with a Jewish homosexual and you’re going to say that Christians have been persecuted?”
And Senator McKenzie’s glowing remarks didn’t stop there. In a discussion about the latest cost measures at the national broadcaster, after ten years of savage funding cuts by the government she was a member of, Bridget took aim at Labor’s Minister for Government Services. Bill Shorten and asked:
“More money [for the ABC]Bill?”
However, nowhere was the ABC’s shift in approach to news and information more evident than when it suspended all regular news coverage on both ABC TV and ABC Radio will be replaced by weeks of dedicated coverage and “special programming to reflect on the life of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, following her death at the age of 96”.
As we previously reported,
“… Viewers tuning into News Breakfast to find everyone dressed in black and ABC chair Ita Buttrose herself appearing to talk to Sarah Ferguson and David Speers about the gloves he wore the last time the Queen visited this colony, he beat the parody.
The only remaining bastions of serious news coverage seem to be Laura Tinglethe 7.30 segment and the iconic 4 corners show, but hey, give the powers that be to ABC a little more time to “fix” these too!
Like Dave Donovan he tweeted:
ABC press release on 15 June 2023
In response to budget pressures, the CBA has unfortunately been forced to make the following cuts:
– 7.30 will become 6.45;
– Q&A is now &A; i
– From now on, 4 Corners is known as Triangle.
Thank you for your support of public broadcasting.
ABC
Media release
June 15, 2023
In response to budget pressures, the CBA has unfortunately been forced to make the following cuts:
– 7.30 will become 6.45;
– Q&A is now &A; i
– From now on, 4 Corners is known as Triangle.
Thank you for your support of public broadcasting.
— Dave Donovan (@davrosz) June 16, 2023
You can follow IA Managing Editor Michelle Pini on Twitter @vmp9. Follow Independent Australia on Twitter @independentus and on Facebook HERE.
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