John Laws has done us all a big favour.
The exposure of his arrangement with the Australian Bankers Association (which represents the major banks) to be paid $1 million to do some advertorial segments and to make some positive statements about the banks could have many benefits.
First it exposes talk-back on commercial radio for what it is: entertainment and commerce. It is not there to inform, but make money. It has ever been thus. Commercial radio talk-back hosts sell their voices in advertisements and get benefits for being positive about certain products.
John Laws now says he is an entertainer and entrepreneur, not a journalist. Fine. But if you are in commerce you should play by the rules of commerce, not by the rules of journalism.
In commerce, the Trade Practices Act provides penalties for false and misleading conduct – such as pretending you are giving independent opinion which is your own opinion when in reality you are being paid to give those opinions in that way. In commerce and entertainment, you cannot bring politicians on and pretend you are a journalist seeking information and accountability.
The law and regulatory regimes treats advertising and journalism entirely differently. The Trade Practices Act deals with commerce and is geared at stopping people from saying commercial things (like banks and motor cars and groceries) are better than they really are. Defamation law and press council guidelines, on the other hand, are geared to stopping journalists from saying that people are worse than they really are. Life is very easy if you apply the regimes the other way about.
Secondly, the incident exposes the banks. Why did the banks buy Laws instead of advertising their wares? Laws (inexplicably) has credibility with the masses. They follow him; they trust him. So the masses might think better of the banks if John Laws thinks the banks are not so bad after all.
More importantly, though, the banks know that the politicians, especially the Coalition politicians, are influenced by what goes on on talk-back radio. John Howard has said as much. Or at least he has said talk-back carries enormous influence. So if talk-back is saying the banks are bad and banks are hitting the battlers, politicians will be wary of doing nice things for the banks. Indeed, they will be willing to do nasty things to the banks because there will be no voter backlash. At a time when bank mergers are in the air and questions are being asked about regulating bank fees, this is pernicious. The banks are trying to influence policy in an underhand way. The million dollar fee to do so is trivial to them, compared to the millions gained or saved with mergers and no regulation.
Third the politicians are exposed. They have been listening to and joining in to talk-back for too long. Now we know that they have been listening to – entertainment. And entertainers want a repeat act, so they go soft.
Entertainment is no substitute for serious policy construction. Hitherto they have been following. They have been too scared to lead.
What if the health funds, the pharmaceutical industry and others did what the banks? Who knows other industries might have. We would have policy by talk-back entertainment.
So, thank you John Laws for writing yourself from the policy script. After this, only the courageous or foolish politician would go on commercial talk-back or take it seriously.
Fourth, it will expose the weakness in the regulatory regime for broadcasting. Self-regulation came in in 1992. It is no substitute for enforceable standards. With any luck, this case will show that the Australian Broadcasting Authority is not an authority at all. Then, maybe ethical codes will be compulsory for those who want the privileges of journalism. Others become advertisers and entertainers. And would John Howard be seen on an advertisement paid for by anyone other than the Liberal Party or discuss policy on a variety show?
The case will expose the weakness in legal system. If any of the myriad of inquiries result in legal action we will see how money gets best legal advice and the best legal advice gets results irrespective of morality. Fels and Flint have given us the benefit of their measured tones citing this law and that law, but their greatest contribution will not be any findings about Laws, rather it will be to keep the matter in the public arena as a constant reminder to people not to take the slightest notice of talk-back radio – least of all Laws’s defence of himself this week.
But we can take Laws at his word on one matter – that he is an entertainer. And we don’t take entertainers seriously; we laugh at them.
And we sure have had some entertainment this week.