The John Brogden story reveals Australian journalism in a state of moral confusion and publishers easy prey to manipulation.
Brogden resigned as Leader of the Opposition in NSW a month after events at the Hilton Hotel. These events – insulting the former Premier’s wife and touching up and propositioning two women – were heard and witnessed by half a dozen journalists and the two women were themselves journalists.
Why did it take a month for the story to get to the public?
The journos cannot have it both ways. They might have thought that on July 29, the date of the events, that the conversations and actions were essentially a private matter. After all, the public says it is sick of the media intruding into private lives even if it is the private life of public person and even if it shows that person in a bad light.
If that was the case on July 29, surely it was still the case in late August.
If it was not the case in late August, then it was not the case on July 29. In that instance it means the journalists and their publishers failed the people of NSW by making them endure a man not fit to be alternative Premier for a month longer than necessary.
The media often pleads that less-than-perfect journalism is a reasonable price to pay sometimes because the public interest requires speedy publication. So why hold back for a month? Surely it does not take that long to check the facts – particularly if you were witness to them.
The logic is compelling. It reveals a collective moral ambivalence.
I say collective because one of the explanations for the delay is a different attitude by individual journalists on one hand and their editors on the other.
One must have some sympathy for the two women journalists – the gropee and propositionee. Their privacy must be considered. They might have thought that it would be a bit tacky to write a piece saying: “Opposition Leader propositioned me.”
Only when the rumours ripened and came to ears of people higher up in the food chain did the balance slide from what would be a tacky revelation of semi-private conversation to a grand expose of a politician in the public interest.
The fact this story took a month to come out gives credence to the theory that political manipulation was involved. The journalists needed prodding. The more widespread a rumour becomes the more difficult it is for the media to ignore it because news executives would be worried that a competitor might publish first. Interesting that journalists, so often accused of racing into print with any grubby second-hand privacy-invading gossip – needed so much prodding. Brogden – on the left of the Liberal Party – had enemies on the Right, who would happily see him gone and spread the rumour in hope of coverage.
Sources very often have motives ulterior to the public interest, even if the publication of their material is beneficial to the public. Deep Throat himself was more interested in revenge on the Nixon White House for passing him over as head the FBI than exposing wrong-doing. The trick for the journalist is to extract the public-interest material without compromising ethical and privacy bounds by publishing material according to the source’s agenda.
The whole affair highlights a profession (or is it a trade?) without a coherent set of principles to guide privacy intrusion and the treatment of sources and the material they reveal.
What is public? What is private? The Brogden case now makes it clear that the private sphere has shrunk. Kerry Chikarovski’s statement that nothing is off the record with a journalist will, unfortunately, become unwritten law for all politicians. Journalists will no longer be privy to the deliciously vicious comments that politicians sometimes make on semi-private occasions – often most viciously directed at people on their own side. Journalists will lose that insight.
And what of the treatment of sources? What do “off the record”, “background”, “Chatham House rules” or “for your information only” really mean? Different things to different people. The terms would be best avoided and replaced with a clear understanding between journalist and source as to what can be published and how can it be attributed.
Unlike lawyers and doctors, Australian journalists do not have a professional standards body with enforcement powers. This is because journalists are usually employees and so have a duty to their employer as well as the public.
The journalists union for a long time has had a code of ethics, but the union is also an industrial body so employers, quite reasonably, do not want to submit their journalists to it. Moreover, it does not cover non-union journalists. Many newspapers have their own codes. The Press Council is weakened because News Ltd is not a member and it does not cover broadcasting. The Australian Broadcasting Authority – through the Jones and Laws cases – has proven its worthlessness.
And freedom of speech means you cannot bar a journalist from practice in the way you can a doctor or lawyer.
The Brogden case – both the initial story and the threatened follow ups that pushed Brogden to attempt suicide – again show the need for a nationally agreed set of principles and some independent body to hear complaints.
The case shows also that the media and the public should look at their values. One politician behaves obnoxiously in a racist and sexist way in a hotel bar, but does not in fact create much harm. He is driven from office. Other politicians can send a nation to war on false pretext, lock refugees up without trial and deny an apology to Indigenous people in a far more harmful, racist and sexist way. They get re-elected.