Adjudication No. 891 (November 1996) [1996] APC 65

ADJUDICATION No. 891 (November 1996)

The Australian Press Council has dismissed a complaint made by John Coochey over an article "Understanding stats that don't figure" published in The Courier-Mail, Brisbane, 17 August 1996.

The article questioned the assertions by Mr Coochey and by men's rights groups that domestic violence is gender-neutral and that a frequently quoted American study showed that, in about 50 per cent of cases, women were the perpetrators of violence.

Mr Coochey objected to two specific statements in the article:

* that "most studies (in Australia) estimate men comprise 3-5 per cent of domestic violence victims (although in the United States, some widely accepted studies put the figure between 5-10 per cent)";

* that Mr Coochey, in contending that claims about violence against women are widely exaggerated, "...dismisses commonly accepted research from a range of sources, including the Federal Government, academics, the police, the Australian Bureau of Statistics, and the United Nations".

In a letter to The Courier-Mail, which was not published, Mr Coochey said the author of the article had admitted to him that no such research existed. He reiterated this claim in his complaint to the Press Council saying the reporter, when he contacted her, had admitted there were many errors in her article, "especially concerning references to studies which she now admits do not exist".

In its reply, The Courier-Mail said the reporter had made no such admissions, nor had any promise been held out that the paper would publish Mr Coochey's letter.

Other letters from him had been published, and his views had received extensive coverage in columns in the paper's feature pages earlier in the year.

The paper said Mr Coochey's unpublished letter canvassed points made in the letters previously published, and it believed because of this and the extensive coverage of his viewpoint in the feature articles, he had had "a fair go".

Mr Coochey's claim that the reporter admitted being in error and using unsourced material is in direct conflict with the reporter's denial of any such admission, and so is not a matter on which the Press Council can adjudicate.

However, it accepts The Courier-Mail's contention that Mr Coochey's views have had extensive coverage in the paper, and for this reason the complaint is dismissed.