Tasmanian politicians have been an interesting bunch to observe over the past few weeks, not the least for how they have been playing the press gallery.
First came the Liberal Party leak that the guns were out for Eric Abetz and the senator’s pre-selection was under threat.
The anti Abetz camp had all three dailies believing they had the story to themselves.
The Advocate’s Sean Ford, who isn’t a member of the parliamentary gallery but is Devonport based, was reported to be stunned to find out that his scoop was in fact repeated in all the papers on the same day.
But he wasn’t as shocked as the Mercury’s Ellen Whinnett, who fell hook, line and sinker for the assurance of an exclusive and her editor slapped the paper’s meaningless “newsbreaker” tag above her story.
The Mercury reporter woke up to discover that not only did the other papers have the story, but the Examiner had it on the front page – something her “newsbreaker” was not honoured with in the Mercury.
Liberal Party insiders manipulated the press, but their efforts had a sequel a week later on the day before Premier Jim Bacon’s state of the state address.
Again, all three papers were told they were being given exclusive leaks about the contents of the Premier’s address. This time the leaks came from the State Government and were approved by the Premier himself.
True to the promise, the newspapers were indeed given exclusives but they were vastly different from each other.
Amanda Allie at the Advocate was officially leaked the news that the speech would contain a commitment to honour the legacy of World War I veteran Frank MacDonald by way of an annual essay competition.
The Examiner’s Chris Johnson was thrown a bone about extra funding being poured into York Park – the “home” of AFL football in Tasmania.
Both of those stories were of interest to the newspapers’ respective regions, but the Mercury was handed a much stronger preview and a story of statewide interest.
Whinnett scooped the others in reporting that the Premier would announce a weakening of the Forest Practices Board and the removal of under-treasurer Don Challen from the state’s gaming commission.
Government media advisers must have thought they had concocted a great strategy of keeping each of the press reporters happy while playing them off against each other.
The strategy backfired.
Chris Johnson is reported to have been so outraged that he had been caught up in a government game, and that the Examiner came off second best to the Mercury, that he waged war on the spot.
A gallery reporter said Johnson was overheard in the corridors of parliament explaining to Bacon’s press secretary Craig Martin, in clear and colourful terms, that the gloves were off.
Johnson normally goes reasonably hard against the Government anyway, but tempers his attacks with the occasional syrupy feature so as not to get Labor completely offside.
He also ridicules the Opposition regularly, for which the Government must be grateful, but Labor is growing increasingly annoyed at Johnson’s critical reports against it.
His threat to the press secretary was apparently not made lightly because his report of Bacon’s speech in Wednesday’s Examiner was damning.
Under the headline “Bacon trips lightly over the issues” Johnson wrote that the contents of the address did not live up to the hype surrounding it.
He even gave credit to the Greens for Bacon’s move on forestry and gaming.
His coverage of parliament was not favourable the rest of the week and his Saturday opinion column gave the Premier another stinging swipe for delivering a poor address.
None of the papers gave the speech the prominence Bacon had hoped for.
He got his “newsbreaker” in the Mercury as a preview to the speech, but talk of phasing out clearfelling in old-growth forests was buried the next day behind a front page screaming about insults shared between Michael Hodgman and Paul Lennon.
Bacon got good broadcast coverage of his address, but the newspapers largely dismissed it except for some predictable leader articles from the editors.
There was obviously some form of payback for the game the Government was playing with its selective leaks, but the newspapers’ reportage was right… it was a very weak speech.
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Sunday, September 28, 2003