Adjudication No. 683 (November 1993) [1993] APC 75

ADJUDICATION No. 683 (November 1993)

The Australian Press Council has dismissed a complaint by Mr Geoffrey Reading over a sentence in a humorous column about Telecom in The Sydney Morning Herald. The writer, referring to alleged corruption in the obtaining of telephone services in "the good old days", says, "It was a great, cheap service, even if you did end up with more illegal connections than Robert Askin".

Mr Reading complained that the article defamed Sir Robert and that a letter he wrote in response was not published.

The article, the subject of this complaint, is not about Sir Robert Askin. The complaint relates to one line, reflecting NSW parliamentary folklore, written in an amusing vein. It is therefore very different from the article, which was the subject of a previous Council adjudication (No. 630), which was relied upon by Mr Reading in presenting his complaint.

In the Council's Adjudication No. 630, on a complaint, also from MrReading, relating to an article about corruption and scandalous behaviour over much of the history of the New South Wales parliament, the Council stated:

"Debate about Sir Robert Askin's alleged corruption, or that of any other powerful politician, is justified in the public interest, but newspapers have a responsibility to distinguish allegation from proved fact. The Press Council recognises that the debate about Sir Robert, in particular, has remained vigorous over many years; and that claims of wrong-doing, while unproved, have not abated.

"In the first part of its reference to Sir Robert Askin in the disputed article, the paper flatly stated ... Sir Robert Askin's corruption ... While the statement was sourced to another newspaper, readers unfamiliar with the debate on the issue could be excused for taking the allegation as proved fact. It is for this failure to distinguish between fact and allegation that the Press Council upholds part of the complaint."

It is not, of course, for the Press Council to determine whether or not the late Premier was corrupt. The Council rules on whether a newspaper behaves responsibly.

In the course of its earlier adjudication, the Council used the term "proved fact". This was not only a regrettable tautology, it may have suggested to some readers that the Council had ruled that claims of criminal behaviour could only be reported as fact if they were so found by a court of law. This was never the Council's intention.

Whether a report of criminal behaviour should be published, and whether it should be accepted as factual, involves a careful investigation, including a determination as to whether it is in the public interest and whether it is fair to private rights to publish. The article involved in Adjudication No. 630 wasnot, on the face of it, the result of such an investigation - it was an historical article based on other sources.

Some readers of that earlier article would have known little or nothing about the Askin government; they were entitled to know that the widespread view that the Premier was corrupt has not gone unchallenged.

The Press Council finds no fault on the part of the newspaper in publishing the bylined humorous article and considers that the editor of the letters section had no obligation to publish a letter from Mr Reading in terms which have frequently appeared.