Fairfax responds to Tracey Spicer

Few publications have done more to expose wrongdoing in the wake of the global #MeToo movement than The Sydney Morning Herald. Together with the ABC, the Herald uncovered decades of sexual misbehaviour by television star Don Burke, as well as multiple serious allegations about actor Craig McLachlan. These stories aren’t easy to do. They require genuine bravery from the women involved who take significant legal and reputational risk by making their stories of abuse public. They also require meticulous research and rigorous fact-checking by the media outlets prepared to publish their stories. In this context it was disappointing to read claims from Tracey Spicer in The Saturday Paper (“Starting the first Me Too inquiry”, June 30–July 6) that suggest somehow the Herald could have done more. Spicer’s article included an accusation that we ignored allegations about misconduct at our own workplace. We reject that emphatically. Spicer’s piece contains a number of inaccuracies. For example, we have never had a meeting in the Fairfax boardroom, and three other senior Herald editors were present at our first discussion; Kate McClymont was not. Spicer’s recollection of our conversations (of which she did not take notes) is also selective. But it is the substance of the article that is most concerning. Allegations about hundreds of individuals have been made in the past 10 months. During the course of the Herald’s work with Spicer, we were made aware of two individuals with editorial links to Fairfax. However, Spicer has never disclosed any specifics of the allegations she had received, nor provided any detail that could lead us to make further inquiries. It was made absolutely clear to Spicer by both Fairfax Media and ABC journalists that we would pursue any allegations if there was any evidence supporting the claims. To suggest otherwise insults our journalistic integrity. The work required to verify and establish allegations of this kind is intense, risky and requires time and effort. That’s why one of Australia’s premiere investigative journalists, Kate McClymont, was involved for the Herald. A number of stories have not been published because they failed to meet the necessarily high legal and fairness standards. Ms Spicer has done a great job as an advocate of the #MeToo cause but her piece misunderstands the fact the

Herald is bound by those standards when investigating misconduct allegations of any kind. We continue to take the issue of workplace sexual harassment very seriously and Kate has a number of investigations ongoing. It was a failure of Ms Spicer and The Saturday Paper not to raise the specific allegations that were ultimately published with me or anyone else at Fairfax prior to publication.

– Lisa Davies, editor, The Sydney Morning Herald