Adjudication No. 136 (July 1982) [1982] APC 16

ADJUDICATION No. 136 (July 1982)

The Toowong State School P & C Association in Queensland has complained about a photograph published by The Australian on March 12 this year.

The photograph was published during industrial action by teachers who refused to take some classes. It showed a boy and a girl, their backs to the camera, standing and holding on to the shut gates to a school ground, as though they were shut out. A placard propped against the gates read "No oversize classes". The school was not identified.

The association claims the photograph was "stage managed" It says that the day before publication, teachers at Toowong State School saw two men and two children arrive. One man closed the gates and placed against them a placard left over from a demonstration. The two children, who, the association says, did not attend the Toowong school, were positioned against the gates and a photograph was taken. The association says the photograph portrayed children apparently barred from entering the school, whereas it was open and teachers were in attendance.

The newspaper has replied that whether the photograph was posed or not is a peripheral matter. It says the real issues are that the photograph did not distort facts so as to mislead readers and publication of the photograph was not unfair to any person.

The newspaper published a letter of complaint from the school staff and an editor's note published with it said: "When our photographer and our reporter visited the school the gates were closed. Our staff did not encroach upon the school property, nor did they interfere with the gates".

As the newspaper has not contested the claims about the posing of the photograph, the council can only assume they are correct. While posing photographs in itself is not necessarily undesirable, the council considers that in this case the newspaper went too far. The clear suggestion of the photograph is that the children in it are barred from their school but, not only were no children barred from the school, the children were not even pupils there. Such a photograph is grossly unfair to the teachers. The council considers its publication is unfortunate and upholds the complaint. The newspaper is admonished.