Adjudication No. 69 (October 1979) [1979] APC 22

ADJUDICATION No. 69 (October 1979)

A complaint has been made to the Australian Press Council against The Orana Shopper and The Daily Liberal, both published in Dubbo, in respect of articles which appeared in their issues of August 20 and 22, 1979.

The complaint is that the articles were an attempt to create racial tensions and prejudice because they reported that claims had been made that the employment by a Coonamble firm of two Vietnamese refugees was an employment of cheap labour to the prejudice of local unemployed young people.

A headline in The Daily Liberal, "Jobless Claim: Refugees Providing Cheap Labor," was unfortunate and misleading because it was only partly borne out in the text of the article by a statement attributed to the manager of the employing firm. The general tenor of the articles, however, was not unfavourable to the refugees.

The Press Council is unable to see in the articles any attempt or tendency to create racial tensions or prejudice. It regards the complaint as due to oversensitivity about racial matters.

The complaint is dismissed.