Speaker 1: From Schwartz Media on Daniel James, This is seven Am.
Speaker 1: David Anderson has resigned as Managing director of the ABC.
Speaker 1: Anderson is an ABC lifer. He first joined the ABC
Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty nine and worked his way to the top,
Speaker 1: spending almost six years as the head of the national broadcaster.
Speaker 1: His decision comes as a shock to many. It was
Speaker 1: only last year he accepted a second term offered to
Speaker 1: him by outgoing chairperson Ida Batros in one of her
Speaker 1: last acts in that role. But with Buttro's gone and
Speaker 1: a new chair in Kim Williams, the future of the
Speaker 1: ABC now looks markedly different. Today, ABC veteran John Fame
Speaker 1: tells us what he thinks of the leadership of the
Speaker 1: ABC and who might replace David Anderson. It's Friday, August
Speaker 1: twenty three.
Speaker 2: John.
Speaker 1: Are you surprised to hear that David Anderson has quit
Speaker 1: given he's only just started his second term in the role.
Speaker 2: I'm surprised because when Ita, on her way out the door,
Speaker 2: gave him a new contract, it was implicit in that
Speaker 2: that he wanted to see out a fair chunk of it.
Speaker 2: Now you know, Kim Williams is a force to be
Speaker 2: reckoned with But they've said very nice things about each
Speaker 2: other from day one, and I'm aware there's I mean,
Speaker 2: people talk about there's a bit of tension on the
Speaker 2: top floor. Ultimo, that's a good thing. There should be
Speaker 2: people nervous on the top floorid ultimate with Kim Williams
Speaker 2: out there on the warpath. Apart from which I think
Speaker 2: this is going to sound really horrible, but I'm going
Speaker 2: to say it anyway. I don't think they've done the
Speaker 2: sort of job where they should feel that they aren't
Speaker 2: under pressure. Actually think the organization's gone backwards on a
Speaker 2: whole lot of measures, but that automate the top manager's
Speaker 2: very anxious and nervous. I mean, let me put it
Speaker 2: this way. Let's take first of all, radio. If there
Speaker 2: was one program on one radio station on one network
Speaker 2: that was struggling, you'd say, that's got a problem. The
Speaker 2: presenter's not cutting through, or the producers aren't choosing the
Speaker 2: right subjects or the right talent, and it's not working.
Speaker 2: If you've got a whole radio station that's struggling, you say, well,
Speaker 2: there's a bit of a problem in that particular capital
Speaker 2: city or regional or network, whatever it might be. But
Speaker 2: that's the next thing. The network. You've got whole stations,
Speaker 2: whole networks that are struggling, local radio radio, national news radio,
Speaker 2: Triple J. They're all struggling. So what if they got
Speaker 2: in common. It's not an individual presenter or a team
Speaker 2: or a station, it's the thing they've got in common,
Speaker 2: which is the management and the culture at the management level.
Speaker 2: Under Itebtros became risk averse and I ended up like everyone.
Speaker 2: I was excited when she was appointed. She said lots
Speaker 2: of really good things, and then the dampeners came down
Speaker 2: and she measured success by reducing the number of politicians
Speaker 2: and powerful people complaining about the ABC. Well, that's just wrong.
Speaker 2: If we're doing our job, then people will be complaining,
Speaker 2: and that's a good thing. And so it started to
Speaker 2: be risk averse, anodyne, don't make waves, don't upset people,
Speaker 2: and it meant it wasn't as interesting to listen to
Speaker 2: or to watch on television as well.
Speaker 1: Do you think that Ida Buttrose should have held off
Speaker 1: on David Anderson's reappointment until a new chair was in place.
Speaker 2: I'll go harder than that. Ida Buttros should have left
Speaker 2: a year before she did, and she shouldn't, and no
Speaker 2: chair of a board should appoint someone to a key
Speaker 2: position on their way out the door. It's just plain wrong.
Speaker 2: You're tying the hands of the incoming people, which is
Speaker 2: not right. It's just wrong. It's wrong. Whether it's a
Speaker 2: public broadcaster or any other institution, public or private, it's
Speaker 2: the same in corporate life. You don't do it.
Speaker 1: David Anderson was at the ABC for decades. He worked
Speaker 1: in a lot of different departments. He became the head
Speaker 1: of Television than the director of Entertainment and specialist. I
Speaker 1: was seeing all of the ABC's radio networks, so we
Speaker 1: knew the organization before he got to the top job.
Speaker 1: But what was he like as managing director in your view?
Speaker 1: I think he's been terrific as a managing director. I've
Speaker 1: got on my occasions when I dealt with him, he
Speaker 1: was always very congenial, very supportive.
Speaker 2: He loves the ABC. He lives and breathes the ABC.
Speaker 2: He understands the nuance and the detail and the culture.
Speaker 2: He is popular with most of the people he needs
Speaker 2: to work with. When he came up to Senate estimates,
Speaker 2: when he came up to public brillings, he always stood
Speaker 2: up for the organization. He was a champion and you know,
Speaker 2: he himself is the first to say he's not a
Speaker 2: rock star, but he was always prepared to go in
Speaker 2: and have a go bat hard for the ABC, and
Speaker 2: for that, I think he deserves everybody's thanks. He did
Speaker 2: have a board which for a while. In fact, I
Speaker 2: think you know, going back in history, there were people
Speaker 2: on the ABC board if you go far enough back,
Speaker 2: there were people who were absolutely hostile to the ABC
Speaker 2: and were specifically appointed to try and bash it up
Speaker 2: from the inside. And I'm talking about Janet al Briton
Speaker 2: and Michael Kraeger and the whole Jonathan Shire experiment which
Speaker 2: was just nothing short of disastrous. And then you ended
Speaker 2: up with Michelle Guthrie who I crossed swords with, and
Speaker 2: Justin Milne and they both left, and you know, they
Speaker 2: were planning to sack me and other key people because
Speaker 2: we were upsetting people on the conservative side of politics
Speaker 2: by holding power to account, which is what our job is.
Speaker 2: But their response was, I know, it makes it harder
Speaker 2: for us to go to camber and get funding, so
Speaker 2: you have to go. I mean, that's just outrageous stuff.
Speaker 1: How critical was David in studying the ship after all
Speaker 1: that tumult that you just mentioned.
Speaker 2: And that's I think the key thing, and he restored
Speaker 2: the faith of a lot of staff in the capacity
Speaker 2: of management to actually manage the ABC. I mean, it's
Speaker 2: a very volatile environment. It's a very volatile it's an
Speaker 2: enormous organization and you know, there's a lot of people
Speaker 2: there who don't like being told what to do, which
Speaker 2: from a manager's point of view is pretty tricky.
Speaker 1: In recent years, the ABC has overtly or inadvertently found
Speaker 1: itself in the midst of the cultural wars that would
Speaker 1: add to the complexity of someone like David Anderson's job.
Speaker 1: What were some of the challenges that he faced in
Speaker 1: relation to all of that.
Speaker 2: So there's a lot of this confected outrage that comes
Speaker 2: from the usual suspects.
Speaker 1: The ABC is running this kind of propaganda via its
Speaker 1: own uninformed reporters and you are paying for it.
Speaker 2: Is the far left ABC institutionally racist? What do you
Speaker 2: call a quiet Australian in the ABC? Lonely, very lonely.
Speaker 2: I noticed recently Kim Williams, the ABC should take notice
Speaker 2: of what those confected outrage manufacturers what they're doing. But
Speaker 2: by and large, you know, notice it, but don't respond
Speaker 2: and react to it, and don't ever let them set
Speaker 2: your agenda. So I don't think for a minute that,
Speaker 2: for instance, the Murdoch muckrakers and the shock jocks and
Speaker 2: people like that should be setting the agenda for Australian
Speaker 2: news gathering and news conversations and the zeitgeist. But in
Speaker 2: fact the ABC amplifies them by reacting and responding and
Speaker 2: taking on board what they say. And yeah, David's found
Speaker 2: himself caught up in some of those outrages. But I
Speaker 2: wish the ABC would just chuckle and move on.
Speaker 1: The ABC has some big problems. It's reaching fewer Australians
Speaker 1: each week than at any time in the past decade,
Speaker 1: and this comes after the Labor Gun restored funding to
Speaker 1: the broadcaster. So what do you think an incoming managing
Speaker 1: director needs to know about and do about all of that?
Speaker 2: So the first thing any incoming MD should be told
Speaker 2: is restructures are not the answer. The structures not the problem.
Speaker 2: And don't start thinking that by shuffling the deck chairs
Speaker 2: you're in any way saving the Titanic. It's rubbish. You know,
Speaker 2: we're not having a rebranding. We're not having a reorganization.
Speaker 2: Just forget that. It's a waste of energy, a waste
Speaker 2: of resources, and the collective grown from thousands of ABC
Speaker 2: staff if you announced another restructure would be audible around
Speaker 2: the country. Don't even think about it. Get rid of
Speaker 2: some of the frippery and some of the lifestyle and
Speaker 2: some of the nonsense around the edges, and put our
Speaker 2: resources into the things the public really values from us,
Speaker 2: and the public do value from the ABC, and make
Speaker 2: sure that we do it better. You know, Radio National
Speaker 2: is fantastic. I just want it to be better. It
Speaker 2: rates insignificantly. Well with all that content, how do we
Speaker 2: get better value out of the enormous amounts of money
Speaker 2: that we're spending on making it, which most Australians aren't
Speaker 2: even aware of, the oblivious to it. Well, that's not
Speaker 2: good enough anymore.
Speaker 1: Coming up after the break, how the ABC under its
Speaker 1: new chair, Kim Williams, is going to change. You've seen
Speaker 1: a few chairs of the ABC in your time, John Ye.
Speaker 1: Kim Williams seems to be particularly outspoken about editorial direction
Speaker 1: and criticism focus of things like hard news. Is that
Speaker 1: an unusual thing to hear from a chair a criticism
Speaker 1: of the ABC's own decision making in such a public way.
Speaker 2: I think it's fabulous and I welcome it, and I
Speaker 2: agree with it, and I think it's great that he's
Speaker 2: prepared to call a spade a spade. Now there's an
Speaker 2: interesting dilemma here, because if there was a chair of
Speaker 2: the board who said things I didn't agree with, I'd
Speaker 2: be outraged. I'd say they shouldn't interfere. But because he's
Speaker 2: saying things that I agree with, I'm going hooray and
Speaker 2: cheering him on. No, I don't think the chair of
Speaker 2: the board shouldn't be getting into the weeds of making programs.
Speaker 2: But if the chair of the board has concerns, I
Speaker 2: actually think it's fabulous that he's expressing them, and he's
Speaker 2: putting people under pressure, and so he should. The ABC
Speaker 2: rolled out a new digital front page on the ABC
Speaker 2: dot net dot AU website, and immediately it's full of
Speaker 2: all these sort of lifestyle stories, which, quite frankly, I
Speaker 2: think are a total waste of the ABC's time, money
Speaker 2: and resources and energy In emotion, I don't know why
Speaker 2: they think anybody cares about some of that stuff, because
Speaker 2: it's just not what the ABC should be doing, and
Speaker 2: the energy and the resources should instead be put into
Speaker 2: more investigatory pieces, more holding power to account. And I
Speaker 2: don't care about which coffee is the most ordered coffee.
Speaker 2: And you know, timbuctoo or whatever, give me a break.
Speaker 2: I mean, you know the project can do that if
Speaker 2: the ABC wants to be taken seriously, and what's an audience?
Speaker 2: How about making compelling content instead of trying to go
Speaker 2: down market?
Speaker 1: Are there any obvious contenders to replace David Anderson Kim Williams?
Speaker 1: You really think he's up for the role to do both?
Speaker 2: I think it would be poorly seen and poorly regarded
Speaker 2: as see if oh well, it's a sort of messiah syndrome.
Speaker 2: So in that sense, I don't think you do both.
Speaker 2: It's going to be a really interesting one. Does Kim
Speaker 2: think he can bring about more change as managing director?
Speaker 2: In which case, does he take the gamble of resigning
Speaker 2: from the chairman of the board in order to put
Speaker 2: forward his application, or does he go no, I can
Speaker 2: shape the organization here from the chair. But he has
Speaker 2: long aspired to run the ABC. If he doesn't apply
Speaker 2: for it, he'll look for someone in his image. He'll
Speaker 2: look for someone who is as skeptical of fads and
Speaker 2: fashions of technology that the ABC occasionally seems to get
Speaker 2: completely tied up into knots about Remember Mark Scott spent
Speaker 2: a fortune on MySpace? Well you know, hello ah. But
Speaker 2: that sense of urgency and relentless pursuit of better standards,
Speaker 2: I mean, how can anyone possibly complain or disagree about that?
Speaker 1: John Phone, Thank you so much for your time.
Speaker 2: It's been fun.
Speaker 1: Anything we have don't asked you about the.
Speaker 2: Eating Who should be the next host of Media Watch?
Speaker 1: Who?
Speaker 2: Maybe David Anderson could be free to do it? Now,
Speaker 2: that's the story. David Anderson's resign so he can host
Speaker 2: media Watch. There why there's a scoop for you.
Speaker 1: It all makes sense. Also in the news today, Senator
Speaker 1: Linda Reynolds lawyers have launched another lawsuit against Britney Higgins
Speaker 1: with the aim of gaining access to a two point
Speaker 1: four million federal government settlement. When Miss Higgins received the funds,
Speaker 1: she placed them in a trust. The new lawsuit seeks
Speaker 1: to have funds released from that trust to Miss Higgins
Speaker 1: so that if Senator Reynolds wins her defamation case, it
Speaker 1: will make it easier for her to gain access to them,
Speaker 1: and new parents could soon earn superannuation on top of
Speaker 1: government funded pay per rental leave under new laws introduced
Speaker 1: to Federal Parliament. The laws would allow for parents to
Speaker 1: get twelve percent superannuation, helping one hundred and eighty thousand
Speaker 1: families who access government funded leave following the birth of
Speaker 1: a child. Seven Am is a daily show from SCHWARTZMDIA
Speaker 1: and The Saturday Paper. It is produced by Shane Anderson,
Speaker 1: Sultan Facho, and Zaia Tangral. Our senior producer is Chris
Speaker 1: dan Gate. Our technical producer is Adigas Basto. Sarah McVeigh
Speaker 1: is the head of audio. Eric Jensen is our editor
Speaker 1: in chief. Mixing by Travis Evans, Adigas Basto and Sultan Facho.
Speaker 1: Our theme music is by Ned Beckley and Josh Hogan
Speaker 1: of envelop Bordier. Seven Am is hosted by Ruby Jones
Speaker 1: and myself, Daniel James. See you next week.