Speaker 1: From The Australian. Here's what's on the front. I'm Claire Harvey.
Speaker 1: It's Tuesday, November nineteen. Shishinping is facing his biggest trade
Speaker 1: challenge in more than a decade, and he's aiming to
Speaker 1: counter Donald Trump's taraf by getting Australia on side. In
Speaker 1: his third bilateral meeting with Anthony Albnezi at the g
Speaker 1: twenty somewhat on Tuesday, the Chinese president will seek support
Speaker 1: for open trade. That story's live right now at The
Speaker 1: Australian dot Com Dot you. One of the most influential
Speaker 1: figures in the history of Australian media, Alan Jones, will
Speaker 1: face court on December eighteen, charged with twenty four offenses
Speaker 1: including indecent assault and sexual touching. His lawyer says he'll
Speaker 1: be defending the chargers today. The remarkable power of the
Speaker 1: loved and loathed Alan Jones and what happens to the
Speaker 1: eighty three year old Now, long before there was Kyle
Speaker 1: and Jackie.
Speaker 2: Oh guys, guys, this morning I'm masturbated right and I'm
Speaker 2: so lazy.
Speaker 1: This morning there was Alan Jones.
Speaker 3: She's a clown, Cinderada in a complete clown. I just
Speaker 3: wonder whether Scott Morrison's going to be fully brief to
Speaker 3: shove a sock down the throat.
Speaker 4: I mean, she is a joke.
Speaker 3: This woman an absolute and utter lightweight.
Speaker 4: What about this brain dead Sarah Hansoon Young from the Greens.
Speaker 4: You're a dope, cleaverm or you died in the world.
Speaker 3: Dope.
Speaker 1: The all powerful king of Sydney Breakfast Radio who turned
Speaker 1: his daily AM slot into a platform to terrify politicians,
Speaker 1: hector hapless bureaucrats and demand results for his army of
Speaker 1: devoted listeners. Here he is in twenty fourteen, demanding then
Speaker 1: Minister Malcolm Turnbull show loyalty to Prime Tony Abbott.
Speaker 5: Can I begin by asking you if you could say
Speaker 5: after me this As a senior member of the Abbot government,
Speaker 5: I want to say here, I am totally supportive of
Speaker 5: the Abbot Hockey strategy for budget repair Allan.
Speaker 2: I'm not going to take dictation from you. I am
Speaker 2: a cabinet minister. I support unreservedly and wholeheartedly every element
Speaker 2: in the budget, every single one.
Speaker 1: Jones's power came from his audience, Sydney Siders who loved
Speaker 1: hearing him rip in, but were also charmed by his
Speaker 1: moments of quirky, warmth enthusing about passions like opera.
Speaker 3: The music critic, writing for The New York That described
Speaker 3: Terrasini's performance as quote smoldering, explosive, shrinking, whispering, singing.
Speaker 1: Jones had risen international prominence via rugby union. He was
Speaker 1: a teacher, then a coach at elite boys schools who
Speaker 1: rose to steer the Wallabies back in their glory days.
Speaker 1: Jones and made numerous unsuccessful attempts to stand for politics
Speaker 1: with the Liberal and Country parties, but in the end,
Speaker 1: Jones proved he didn't need a seat in Parliament to
Speaker 1: have a say in running the country. Politicians jumped to
Speaker 1: his command, and sponsors flocked to the show. It was
Speaker 1: those commercial relationships that caused Jones's first brush with national controversy,
Speaker 1: when an inquiry by the Australian Broadcasting Authority found he
Speaker 1: had failed to properly disclose commercial relationships with the brands
Speaker 1: he was sprooking on air. And then in twenty twelve
Speaker 1: at a young Liberal function, the Sunday Telegraph recorded Jones
Speaker 1: saying this when he thought no journalists were present.
Speaker 2: The cause of the.
Speaker 6: Labor Party julized the life everybody.
Speaker 1: If you didn't catch that, Joones said, the then Prime Minister,
Speaker 1: Julia Gillard's recently deceased father had died of shame because
Speaker 1: of what Joanes said were his daughter's lies. It prompted
Speaker 1: a wave of condemnation and a rare expression of regret.
Speaker 7: Jones's apology press conference went for forty five minutes, but
Speaker 7: the word sorry didn't feature.
Speaker 5: I owe her an apology, and I hope I'll be
Speaker 5: able to make that.
Speaker 3: To her, not to her through you.
Speaker 5: You just have to concede and man up and say
Speaker 5: you got it wrong.
Speaker 1: I was the deputy editor of the Sunday Telegraph at
Speaker 1: the time we published that story, and I've got to
Speaker 1: tell you it was hair raising for editor Neil Breen
Speaker 1: and me to publish such a story about a figure
Speaker 1: so powerful and so ruthless. But that moment was a
Speaker 1: small insight into how Jones regarded women. He is lecturing Gillard,
Speaker 1: the Prime Minister, for being late to his show.
Speaker 8: Alan, I believe I am a very courteous person. I'm
Speaker 8: also very busy. If I can finish my sentence, Alan, also,
Speaker 8: I'm also very busy, Rawson and Alan, if I can
Speaker 8: finish my sentence uninterrupted. I've had media commitments this morning.
Speaker 3: Late this morning at ten past seven, would your staff
Speaker 3: agreed on this program?
Speaker 8: Well, Allan, I am happy to apologize to you for
Speaker 8: being late.
Speaker 9: I am now here.
Speaker 8: If you have a question in the nation's interest, then
Speaker 8: please feel free to put it.
Speaker 1: And suggesting what he'd really like to do with Gillard
Speaker 1: and the then Greens leader.
Speaker 4: The woman's offer tree and quite frankly, they should show
Speaker 4: her and Bob Brown in a chaff back and take
Speaker 4: them as far out to see as they can until
Speaker 4: her to swim home.
Speaker 1: At the top of this episode, you heard Jones talking
Speaker 1: about former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda R.
Speaker 10: Dern.
Speaker 1: Here's another moment.
Speaker 3: New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Dern challenging Scott Morrison over
Speaker 3: climate change. Now, I hope Scott Morrison gets tough here
Speaker 3: with a few backhands. Hasn't got a clue this woman.
Speaker 9: There's no question that there has been a lot of
Speaker 9: misogyny in the kinds of things that Jones has said
Speaker 9: over the years.
Speaker 1: Stephen Rice is The Australian's New South Wales editor and.
Speaker 9: I think when he made that comment about Dern, Itt coalesced.
Speaker 9: There were a lot of things happening at the time
Speaker 9: as well. It wasn't just that this was a reminder
Speaker 9: of those things that he'd said, the quite disgraceful things
Speaker 9: sometimes about women. It was also right at the point
Speaker 9: where listeners were already starting to abandon the show, but
Speaker 9: more importantly, advertisers were starting to abandon the show, and
Speaker 9: not just abandon the show, abandoned two GB as a station,
Speaker 9: as a radio station. So you had all this background
Speaker 9: where his influence is fading because he's a dinosaur and
Speaker 9: he's not reading the room. Other broadcasters are moving with
Speaker 9: the times. Jones just doesn't seem to be able to
Speaker 9: do that. He's really stuck on certain lines. And maybe
Speaker 9: you could get away with that and your audience would
Speaker 9: just dwindle a bit, but you'd hang around. But when
Speaker 9: you're saying stuff like chuff bag and chuck them in
Speaker 9: the sea, advertisers will abandon you, and that's what they
Speaker 9: were doing.
Speaker 1: Jones retired from radio in twenty twenty and tried television
Speaker 1: with Sky News, but the audience didn't follow him, and
Speaker 1: Jones left in twenty twenty one. In twenty twenty three,
Speaker 1: nine newspaper The Sydney Morning Herald published a series of
Speaker 1: allegations by men that Jones had indecently assaulted them, including
Speaker 1: claims he'd put his hands down two young men's pants,
Speaker 1: passionately kissed a then schoolboy without his consent, and sexually
Speaker 1: touched an employee who was driving him to work from
Speaker 1: his apartment at Sydney's Circular Key. Jones denied all the allegations.
Speaker 1: On Monday morning, police raided that Circular Key apartment and
Speaker 1: took Jones away.
Speaker 11: Alan Jones, once one of the most influential media identities
Speaker 11: in Australia, is now under arrest over allegations he and
Speaker 11: decently assaulted multiple young men.
Speaker 1: Police executed a warrant at the eighty three year old's
Speaker 1: luxury Sydney apartment at Circular Key this morning. He has
Speaker 1: been charged with twenty four offenses spanning two decades, including
Speaker 1: eleven charges of aggravated in decent assault, nine charges relating
Speaker 1: to assault with active indecency, two charges of sexual touching,
Speaker 1: and two charges of common assault. The police will allege
Speaker 1: Jones's youngest victim was seventeen years old when me alleged
Speaker 1: offense occurred. His Assistant Commissioner Michael Fitzgerald from New South
Speaker 1: Wales Police, giving a media conference on Monday.
Speaker 10: I wish to commend the investigators of Strikeforce Bonavan for
Speaker 10: their tenacity and their hard work and bringing this matter
Speaker 10: before the courts. Historical matters such as this are incredibly
Speaker 10: hard to investigate and bring before the courts. I wish
Speaker 10: to commend the victims and their bravery in coming forward.
Speaker 10: They fully are aware, as are the investigators, that the
Speaker 10: hard work is just beginning, and they have given their
Speaker 10: statements fully aware that they will go before the courts.
Speaker 1: Jones has not yet been required to enter a plea,
Speaker 1: but he's consistently denied any wrongdoing. On Monday, his lawyer
Speaker 1: Chris Murphy said the charges would be defended and attacked
Speaker 1: Michael Fitzgerald for describing the witnesses as victims, saying that
Speaker 1: was a matter for the courts coming up after the
Speaker 1: Break Southwales editor Stephen Rice on what we can expect
Speaker 1: from the King versus Alan Jones when this matter goes
Speaker 1: to trial. Stephen Rice spoke to the Front's Christen Amiot Rice.
Speaker 1: He says Jones is.
Speaker 9: Probably the best broadcast of the country. He's ever seen.
Speaker 9: I love him or hate him. He is just a
Speaker 9: force of nature and yes he's bombastic. H'll harangue prime
Speaker 9: minister's businessman, you name it. Alan Jones will be in there,
Speaker 9: taking absolutely no prisoners. A lot of our younger listeners
Speaker 9: may have difficulty just grasping the kind of power that
Speaker 9: he wielded, especially today in the age of social media
Speaker 9: in a very fragmented media. But in the eighty and
Speaker 9: nineties and early two thousands, radio was the way to
Speaker 9: reach the hearts and minds of people in Sydney. It
Speaker 9: had that immediacy that social media does now. Before Alan
Speaker 9: Jones came along, it was a cheerful kind of round
Speaker 9: that early morning radio shift, and Jones just turned that
Speaker 9: around and made it into a really serious, I will
Speaker 9: break your that kind of style of radio. And he
Speaker 9: took politicians to task and people responded to that.
Speaker 7: Alan Jones has of course denied any wrongdoing and we
Speaker 7: will need to wait to see for this to play
Speaker 7: out in court. But if and when this does come
Speaker 7: to trial, what do you think we can expect to see?
Speaker 9: From everything we know Jones will plead not guilty. He's
Speaker 9: said very clearly on a number of occasions since The
Speaker 9: Sydney Morning Herald came out with its allegations that he
Speaker 9: is not guilty, that those allegations are false.
Speaker 7: You mentioned just now that Alan Jones is likely to
Speaker 7: plead not guilty. He's vehemently denied these allegations in the past.
Speaker 7: Who do you think we can expect to see representing
Speaker 7: him if and when this does go to trial.
Speaker 9: Look, I expect we'll see a phalanx of Australia's best
Speaker 9: cases lining up to represent Jones. Behind the scenes, He's
Speaker 9: still got plenty of friends, plenty of supporters. Alan Jones
Speaker 9: famously has a what he calls a pick and stick club.
Speaker 9: They are the rusted on friends and supporters who he
Speaker 9: will never abandon and who he thinks and hopes will
Speaker 9: never abandon him. He'll have plenty of friends working to
Speaker 9: ensure that he gets a fair trial.
Speaker 1: Alan Jones has been granted conditional bail to appear before
Speaker 1: the Downing Center Local Court on DECENTI eighteen. Stephen Rice
Speaker 1: is The Australian's Sydney bureau chief. We've got the full
Speaker 1: inside story of how this arrest transpired and what precipitated
Speaker 1: the drama live right now at the Australian dot com
Speaker 1: dot au