Speaker 1: From Sports Media on Daniel James, this is seven Am.
Speaker 1: It sounds like a bad dream. You're on stage, you
Speaker 1: say something about Joe Rogan, and suddenly you're the subject
Speaker 1: of a global pylon led by the world's richest man,
Speaker 1: Elon Musk. But this is what the chair of the ABC,
Speaker 1: Kim Williams, recently endured at the comments he made at
Speaker 1: the National Press Club.
Speaker 2: I think people like mister Rogan pray on people's vulnerabilities,
Speaker 2: They pray on fear, they pray on anxiety.
Speaker 1: But Williams wasn't there to talk about Rogan. He was
Speaker 1: there to defend the ABC, an institution still dealing with
Speaker 1: a decade of cuts, staff departures and questions about management's
Speaker 1: ability to guide the national broadcaster in an age of
Speaker 1: lies designed to sew division. Today, Kim Williams on the
Speaker 1: challenges and why he insists he's in the right job.
Speaker 1: It's Monday, December ninth. Kim, thanks so much for joining
Speaker 1: us as Vaniel. You've had a deep interest in the
Speaker 1: ABC for such a long time, like so many Australians,
Speaker 1: but one would argue that your interest has been deeper
Speaker 1: than most. If the ABC is firing on all cylinders.
Speaker 1: What does that look like?
Speaker 3: Well, if the ABC is firing on all cylinders, I
Speaker 3: think it becomes the indispensable ally to being an Australian citizen.
Speaker 3: It is a useful contributor to your worldview. It is
Speaker 3: a useful participant in your formation of thoughts and ideas
Speaker 3: and priorities.
Speaker 4: Into of our nation and its direction.
Speaker 3: It's a useful barometer of community perception, of community sentiment,
Speaker 3: and it is a place that is devoted to interrogating
Speaker 3: and celebrating that which is about Australia and the many
Speaker 3: audiences and communities that constitute the Australian nation. I think
Speaker 3: those are the sorts of elements and virtues that the
Speaker 3: ABC pumping on all cylinders would constitute.
Speaker 1: At a time where people can get their news and
Speaker 1: their entertainment from anywhere or anyone, the ABC is reaching
Speaker 1: less Australians, with the primer driver of that being a
Speaker 1: decline in ABC news. Do you have an opinion as
Speaker 1: to what that might be?
Speaker 3: Well, I don't agree with the question, and I don't
Speaker 3: agree with the underpinning to your question. The ABC is
Speaker 3: the number one source of news in Australia. ABC Online
Speaker 3: is getting a weekly audience of around twelve million Australians
Speaker 3: and to my knowledge, and please feel free to correct me, Danielbert,
Speaker 3: I don't think anyone else is getting that kind of audience. Now,
Speaker 3: your question may refer to a diminishment in news consumption
Speaker 3: on the part of Australians. I am not convinced that
Speaker 3: is correct. I understand a number of people produce material
Speaker 3: that says news consumption is down. I'm a skeptic about
Speaker 3: this kind of popular notion of news avoidance and I'm
Speaker 3: very very cautious in accepting it as an established fact.
Speaker 1: The client I was referring to came from the government's
Speaker 1: website Transparency dot gov, and this is a direct quote.
Speaker 1: ABC News Web has been the primary driver of overall
Speaker 1: network declient with weekly users averaging seven point seven million,
Speaker 1: which is of course a high number, but that's down
Speaker 1: by thirty percent year on year. That's the decline. We're
Speaker 1: talking about, a decline from viewers from the ABC itself.
Speaker 3: Well, I don't know when that report was published. Certainly
Speaker 3: from the time of the relaunch of the ABC Digital
Speaker 3: News offering, our numbers are very much higher than that.
Speaker 1: Kim not long after he started his chair Managing Director
Speaker 1: David Anderson announced he was resigning a year into his
Speaker 1: second term after more than thirty years at the ABC.
Speaker 1: What does that meant for the stability in the way
Speaker 1: the broadcaster is currently being run.
Speaker 3: Well, we're in a moment of transition. David has been
Speaker 3: on some personal leave recently, but he'll be back next
Speaker 3: week and I would think David would continue to provide
Speaker 3: the steady pair of hands that he has provided for
Speaker 3: an extended period of time over the last six years,
Speaker 3: and as he had provided previously in a variety have
Speaker 3: different roles at the ABC. We are recruiting a new
Speaker 3: managing director and I'm confident that we will have an
Speaker 3: appropriate replacement available for announcement in due course.
Speaker 1: What is that period of transition from David as managing
Speaker 1: director to this new managing director meant for the organization?
Speaker 1: In practice?
Speaker 3: I think in practice it means that there is a
Speaker 3: certain degree of caution Internally, there are elements of normal
Speaker 3: antibody rejection of fresh thinking and new ideas. That's a
Speaker 3: very institutional response to change, and that there are also
Speaker 3: a lot of people who have high expectations and very
Speaker 3: real and considerable enthusiasm for refreshed thinking, and that's not
Speaker 3: set in a comment on David at all institutions tend
Speaker 3: to have a deficit of agility, regrettably predictably.
Speaker 1: Yes, I know they're from experience. You recently intervened in
Speaker 1: reversing decision by the managing director to fold radio into
Speaker 1: the Content division. This is something a manager director will
Speaker 1: normally be in charge of. We've spoken to quite a
Speaker 1: few people who say that you are quite an interventionist chair.
Speaker 1: Are you in the wrong job.
Speaker 4: No, I'm not in the wrong job.
Speaker 3: I'm in a very strong role as Chair of the ABC,
Speaker 3: and I am charged with governance responsibilities number one for
Speaker 3: the efficient operation of the ABC and the service of
Speaker 3: all Australians. Number two for protecting and defending the integrity
Speaker 3: and independence of the ABC, and number three for having
Speaker 3: responsibility for the impartiality in the collection and dissemination of
Speaker 3: news and information according to commonly accepted standards of objective journalism.
Speaker 3: They are the three roles described in the ABC Act
Speaker 3: as the responsibilities of the Board of the ABC. I
Speaker 3: think you'll find that all of my actions are entirely
Speaker 3: consistent with the good governance principles that are reflected in
Speaker 3: those things, and of course the ABC Board has the
Speaker 3: custodianship responsibility for the charter.
Speaker 4: The charter is in section six of the ABC Act.
Speaker 3: The responsibilities of the bord are in section eight of
Speaker 3: the ABC Act. I can assure you, Daniel, I sleep
Speaker 3: metaphorically with a copy of the Act under my pillar.
Speaker 1: I was peruising through it this afternoon. I can't pretend
Speaker 1: to know one scuric of it as well as you do. Kim.
Speaker 1: After the break defending change at the ABC, Kim Williams,
Speaker 1: there's been a big shake up with audio at the ABC,
Speaker 1: particularly in Sydney. You defend the management's decision to let
Speaker 1: Sarah McDonald go despite her ratings. Has been an extraordinary
Speaker 1: reaction to that decision. Even in Melbourne. People are talking, Daniel.
Speaker 3: I'm not going to mark any individual inside the ABC's
Speaker 3: report card publicly, so please do not put me in
Speaker 3: a position where you're expecting me to discuss or describe
Speaker 3: any individual inside the ABC. I would never do that,
Speaker 3: and I have not in any way made any comment
Speaker 3: about Sarah McDonald or anybody else inside the fabric of
Speaker 3: the ABC. I think that's holding and appropriate. What I
Speaker 3: have defended is the notion of change within any media organization,
Speaker 3: and I have defended the right and the integrity of
Speaker 3: management in making changes. The notion that anyone has a
Speaker 3: job until they no longer want want that job in
Speaker 3: a public facing role on publicly owned airwaves delivering to
Speaker 3: the broad community of Australians is simply ridiculous.
Speaker 1: So the question was, what do you attribute the extraordinary
Speaker 1: reaction to decisions made about those airways too? I mean,
Speaker 1: is that a deep So.
Speaker 3: You're describing the noise as being extraordinary rather than it's
Speaker 3: simply being a body of noise.
Speaker 1: Well, I don't think you can ignore your audience.
Speaker 4: I don't think one should ever ignore the audience.
Speaker 3: But I don't think you need to keep things in
Speaker 3: perspective relative to the size of the audience and the
Speaker 3: size and volume of the noise.
Speaker 4: All things need to be contextualized.
Speaker 1: Daniel, sure, and I tried to contextualize it. It was
Speaker 1: a big response to a decision made about taking audio
Speaker 1: in a new direction. So what is that new direction?
Speaker 3: Well, I think you'll see that new new direction when
Speaker 3: announcements are made as to fresh announcers and fresh presentation formats.
Speaker 3: That will happen in the course of two thousand and
Speaker 3: twenty five. They will all obviously be publicly promoted and presented,
Speaker 3: and I think they'll be pretty enthusiastic responses from the public.
Speaker 1: I confident that the audio management team has a strong
Speaker 1: handle on what the direction for ABC Radio is over
Speaker 1: the coming years.
Speaker 3: I am I'm exceedingly confident in the capability and the
Speaker 3: creativity that is informing the leadership in audio.
Speaker 1: One of the things that I think pretty much every
Speaker 1: Free to Wear media organization and struggling with at the
Speaker 1: moment is trying to attract and retain young listeners and viewers.
Speaker 1: They tend not to watch Free to Wear live. It
Speaker 1: has not on effectual the ABC down the track as
Speaker 1: people graduate from Triple J to Double J to local
Speaker 1: radio and radio national beyond. How can the ABC not
Speaker 1: only get young viewers and listeners back, but how can
Speaker 1: they retain them?
Speaker 3: Well, I think the ABC in many ways cannot persist
Speaker 3: in regarding an ABC environment as being the exclusive environment
Speaker 3: in which you consume ABC provision content. And I think
Speaker 3: you need to respect the audience and respect the behaviors
Speaker 3: and respect the preferences of the audience in consuming material.
Speaker 3: In other domains, for example, in YouTube or on TikTok,
Speaker 3: or in Instagram, or all of the diverse platforms that
Speaker 3: now exist and which clearly enjoy pretty hearty endorsement from
Speaker 3: the community at large in a wide, widely dispersed way
Speaker 3: across many, many forms of consumption.
Speaker 4: Australians own the material.
Speaker 3: And they should have access to it in a wide
Speaker 3: variety of different environments.
Speaker 1: And finally, Kim, in your very entertaining Press Club address
Speaker 1: from the other week, he talked about making mistakes that
Speaker 1: happens to us all and it's important to acknowledge them
Speaker 1: in your time is chair so far? Reflecting on your
Speaker 1: first twelve months in the role, what mistakes have you made?
Speaker 3: Well, I've been here for eight months, not twelve months,
Speaker 3: don't you, Although thank you for making it like twelve months,
Speaker 3: it feels in some ways like two or three years.
Speaker 4: Frequently.
Speaker 3: Look, I don't think it's for me to publicly mark
Speaker 3: my report card.
Speaker 4: It's for others to mark that for me.
Speaker 3: And of course it being Australia, people do they do
Speaker 3: some improfution in some times less than generous terms. But
Speaker 3: I take all criticism on board and processes and respect
Speaker 3: it and value.
Speaker 1: It and probably the most controversial question of all. Before
Speaker 1: I thank you for your time, what's your favorite podcasting?
Speaker 3: Oh gee, that's a tough, tough, tough question. I would
Speaker 3: have to say Ezra Cline is my favorite foreign podcast.
Speaker 3: I think Isracline is that rare beast. He is a
Speaker 3: publicly accessible, agreeable intellectual who grazes across a wide thought domain.
Speaker 3: In terms of Australian podcasts, I'm a big fan of
Speaker 3: Take Me to Your Leader. I find it a really
Speaker 3: really terrific podcast and I never miss a copy. But
Speaker 3: I'm a very very big user of podcasts and grays
Speaker 3: equally here and internationally.
Speaker 1: Well, Kim, thank you for coming on our podcast. Thanks
Speaker 1: for your time.
Speaker 3: I should say I think you do a pretty good
Speaker 3: podcast too.
Speaker 1: That's that's all you have to say to him. That's
Speaker 1: all you have to say, thank you, Okay.
Speaker 4: Bye.
Speaker 1: Also in the years today, a Labor Cabinet minister has
Speaker 1: rejected Israeli Prime Minister Benjaminetto Who's statement linking in Melbourne
Speaker 1: synagogue fire bombing to Australia's vote in favor of a
Speaker 1: UN resolution demanding Israel and its occupation of Palestinian territory
Speaker 1: In a post on x NATO, who put blame on
Speaker 1: what he called the Alberanezi government's extreme anti Israeli position.
Speaker 1: Employment of Workplace Relations Minister Murray Wat said he respectfully
Speaker 1: disagrees and that the UN resolution was a step towards
Speaker 1: peace and organizers of the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Marti
Speaker 1: Gras have voted not to ban New South Wales Police
Speaker 1: officers from marching out next year's parade. Three different proposals
Speaker 1: were put to the Marti Gras annual Drenial meeting to
Speaker 1: either block or limit New South Wales Police officers participation
Speaker 1: in the parade, and all three motions were narrowly defeated.
Speaker 1: I'm Daniel James to be listening to seven AM. We'll
Speaker 1: be back tomorrow