Adjudication No. 1090 (July 2000) [2000] APC 25

ADJUDICATION No. 1090 (July 2000)

The Australian Press Council has upheld in part a complaint by Cr Andrew Petrie, Mayor of Woollahra Municipal Council, and four other Liberal councillors, against the Wentworth Courier.

On 5 April 2000, the Wentworth Courier published a letter purportedly written by a Bernard Potter-Smythe. The letter exhorts those residents of Woollahra municipality who habitually vote for the Liberal Party to refrain from so-doing at the next council elections. There is a suggestion in the letter of `undisclosed conflicts of interest' involving developers in Woollahra and Liberal councillors. There is a further suggestion that `certain Liberal councillors always vote as a block against the public good'.

The complainants assert that the letter `is not honest and fair'. They further assert that Bernard Potter-Smythe is a false name intended to mislead the public into believing that the writer is a Liberal voter who is disillusioned with the local Council.

The five Woollahra councillors wrote to the paper expressing concerns about the letter and the identity of the writer. On 26 April 2000 the paper published a letter from Kevin Berry, a Woollahra Councillor who is not a Liberal, and not one of the five councillors who originally wrote to the paper to express concern. Although his letter canvassed some of the concerns expressed by the complainants, they did not regard it as having satisfied their complaint.

The Press Council believes that no reader should be misled as to a correspondent's identity. Newspapers have a duty to carry out an investigation into the identity of correspondents, especially where serious issues are raised and allegations made.

In this case, the newspaper has not provided an assurance that adequate checks were made. To that extent, the complaint is upheld.

Regarding the content of the subject letter, the Press Council believes that any newspaper has the right to publish letters from the public as it sees fit for the public interest. To deny a newspaper the right to do so would be to undermine a fundamental feature of the freedom of the press.

In the case at hand, the newspaper published a rebuttal letter from an independent Woollahra councillor on the letters page, with similar prominence, 21 days later. The fact that this letter was not from the complainants does not diminish its value as a balancing opinion, particularly since it made similar points to those which were made by the complainants.