Political row brews at ABC

The chairman of the Australian Broadcasting Corp resigned yesterday over allegations that he pressured the independent national broadcaster to fire two political journalists because the ruling conservative Government disliked them.

The scandal has damaged the credibility of both the governing coalition and the ABC, which is Government-funded but is required by law to operate independently of party politics. The ABC is many Australians’ most trusted news source.

ABC chairman Justin Milne announced on Monday that ABC managing director Michelle Guthrie, who is also the broadcaster’s editorin-chief, had been fired halfway through her five-year contract because the board did not like her leadership style.

Media reports have since alleged that Milne, who is responsible for maintaining ABC independence, had unsuccessfully pressured Guthrie to fire political editor Andrew Probyn and chief economics correspondent Emma Alberici to prevent potential cuts in government funding.

Milne, who was appointed by the conservative Government last year and is a friend of former Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, said he had quit for the good of the corporation.

“It’s clearly not a good thing for everybody to be trying to do their job with this kind of fire storm going on, so I wanted to provide a release valve,” Milne told the ABC in a television interview.

Milne said his resignation was “absolutely, 100 per cent not” an admission that he had failed to safeguard the ABC’s editorial independence.

Fairfax Media has reported that Milne wrote an email to Guthrie calling for Alberici be fired on May 8, a day after Turnbull complained to the ABC’s news director about an Alberici report on government spending.

“They [the government] hate her,” Milne reportedly wrote to Guthrie.

Turnbull, who has lived in New York since he was ousted as Prime Minister on August 24, said yesterday that while he had complained about the two reporters’ journalism, he had never asked for them to be fired.