TVNZ chief correspondent John Campbell. Photo / Greg Bowker
A series of interesting Media Council decisions about columns and opinion writing throws up some considerations and warnings for newsrooms and their editors. As media companies tackle a fall in trust, the importance of clearly labelled opinions and timely responses to complaints is reiterated.
A reader was so angry about one of TVNZ chief correspondent John Campbell’s columns that she took it to the Media Council, describing it as a “rant”. The council has rejected the complaint but not before making some important observations on why the piece did not breach its principles.
At the same time, the council has upheld unrelated complaints about two Stuff columns written by two other authors. So why did those columns come to grief when Campbell’s one was deemed okay?
Reader Susan Fogarty was dismayed by a piece written by Campbell and published on TVNZ’s website, onenews.co.nz, in November last year, in which TVNZ’s chief correspondent took aim at the new coalition Government.
The column, which appeared the day after the new coalition Government had been announced, was headlined, “I hoped to be surprised - actually I’m amazed”.
Campbell did not mean this kindly.
As the Media Council noted, the column expressed “John Campbell’s disappointment at the coalition agreements and, in his view, their lack of attention to climate change and poverty, a ‘deeply regressive’ approach to race relations and misguided support for landlords and gun-owners”.
Campbell was, said the council, “strongly critical of the three coalition parties and their leaders”.
At one stage, he referred to a photo of Christopher Luxon, Winston Peters and David Seymour as they met to thrash out the new coalition agreement.
“It was art imitating life,” wrote Campbell.
“Everything in that photo is empty. The room. The walls. The table. The glasses [which are still upturned because Winston hasn’t yet given Chris and David permission to use them]. And the men, too, as it turned out. Empty of ideas.”
Fogarty was incensed about the column and Campbell’s comments.
“In her initial complaint to TVNZ she argued that as a senior journalist, she expects him to give the public impartial and useful news ‘about all manner of events’,” said the council in its ruling.
“She calls his piece ‘a rant’ and says it provided her as a reader with no impartial information.”
After TVNZ rejected her complaint, Fogarty took the matter to the council, saying that readers might expect anything that Campbell wrote - given his prominence as a journalist - was “based on well-researched facts and is ‘correct’ information, not just his personal views”.
Fogarty told the council that all journalists needed to do these days - when critiqued - was “cry ‘opinion piece’... what a convenient loophole!... So how is the public supposed to know when Mr Campbell’s writing opinion pieces and when he’s being a journalist?”
She told the council that TVNZ, as a public broadcaster, was required to be neutral.
“She says public media should be held to different standards than commercial media. She has no political affiliation and has voted for different parties over time, but expects publicly funded media to be fair, balanced and factual, even with opinion pieces.
“She worries people are losing trust in media because of such columns. She again stresses that John Campbell’s experience, role and influence means special care must be taken.”
The council said that TVNZ rejected the complaint, saying Campbell, “like any journalist, is not limited to writing straightforward news stories”.
“As chief correspondent, he has a mandate from TVNZ to ‘examine topical issues from his perspective’. Readers of his work as chief correspondent understand it includes ‘his personal insights and opinions’.”
Further, TVNZ told the council, the column was clearly an opinion piece and labelled as such.
“Those opinions cannot be perceived as statements of fact. The discussion of issues such as child poverty and ‘re-colonisation’ were clearly presented as Mr Campbell’s opinions, not as fact.”
In its findings, the council said that since its formation in 1972, it was more common today for journalists to express opinions.
“But even then there was a tradition of advocacy journalism and opinion writing. In the years since, it has become increasingly common for journalists from any number of political persuasions to write opinion pieces.”
The council said: “The piece complained about as ‘a rant’ is certainly one with much personal opinion and little analysis, which seems to be core to Susan Fogarty’s concerns.”
“For context, the strength of opinion in this and other recent pieces by John Campbell have sparked debate in the media and on social platforms as it is unusual for someone designated a ‘correspondent’.
“More commonly, those expressing personal opinions distinguish themselves as ‘broadcasters’ or ‘writers’, or if they are news gatherers writing something other than news, offer analysis rather than straight opinion.”
The council said for the complainant, “Seeing a senior correspondent expressing strident personal opinions raises doubts about the impartiality of its reporting and the public’s trust in the media”.
“As it says in the preamble to our principles, the council strongly believes that distinctions between fact and opinion must be maintained for just this reason, so it is important that those who call themselves journalists and do original reporting take care with that distinction. But our preamble continues that ‘editors have ultimate responsibility for what appears in their publications’, as long as they don’t breach the principles.”
TVNZ editors, said the council, were clear that they had given Campbell “a mandate” for such columns.
“This column, as the complainant acknowledges, is clearly labelled ‘opinion’.
“Readers can be under no illusion John Campbell is reporting on the coalition agreements or providing ‘news’; he is expressing personal views and the label makes that clear. It seems unfair to dismiss clear labelling as ‘a loophole’. To answer Ms Fogarty’s question, the public can know when John Campbell is writing opinion by the fact the column is labelled as such.”
Opinion pieces were not expected to be “neutral”, said the council.
“It is in the public interest for public media and commercial media alike to offer a wide range of views to encourage understanding, critical thinking and debate.
“Mr Campbell does, alongside these opinion pieces, still report on ‘all manner of events’. There is no claim his news reporting is inaccurate or unbalanced. So it is up to audiences - the complainant included - to decide whether his opinion pieces alter their views of that reporting.”
The complaint follows public debate about Campbell’s role as chief correspondent at TVNZ.
Former newspaper editor Karl du Fresne came off the long run at Campbell earlier this year, in a scathing column on his own website.
“This is extraordinary and unprecedented,” wrote du Fresne. “The Government’s most potent communications medium has been hijacked by one of its employees and co-opted in a highly personal political mission.”
He called on Campbell to be sacked.
“Campbell clearly decided on October 14 that New Zealand had made a grievous mistake in electing a centre-right Government and set himself the task of leading the Resistance,” wrote du Fresne.
“Someone in authority should have told him then that this was not his function as a journalist. If he refused to accept that, he should have been told to pack his bags.”
Du Fresne said his comments might sound odd coming from a promoter of free speech. But he was also committed to journalistic objectivity and “if the media are to retain the trust of the public, they must demonstrate that they can be relied on to report on issues of public interest in a fair, balanced and non-partisan way.”
AUT’s recent Trust in News survey showed that the public’s perceptions of media in New Zealand had fallen to all-time lows.
One of the reasons cited by co-author Greg Treadwell was that audiences were being turned off by the mixing of opinion with news.
“That doesn’t mean the media doesn’t have a right to its views or that opinion columns aren’t useful, but the audience doesn’t seem to be able to tell the difference and thinks it’s being preached at,” Treadwell told Newshub.
It’s an issue that also came up at NZME’s recent annual shareholders meeting. NZME owns the NZ Herald, Newstalk ZB and a range of regional news titles.
A shareholder asked the board about declining levels of trust in media, following the release earlier this week of the AUT Trust in News survey.
NZME chair Barbara Chapman said the board had a “vibrant” discussion about trust and bias at its meeting earlier that day.
NZME chief executive Michael Boggs said the NZ Herald - considered in another study as the least-biased news outlet in New Zealand - was set to make “labelling improvements” around opinion articles.
“I’m up for improving that in our business but I’m not sure I can improve it for the whole industry.”
Meanwhile, the council has upheld two complaints about unrelated Stuff columns.
It ruled that a column penned for Stuff’s The Press last December by Dr Eric Crampton, the chief economist of the New Zealand Initiative, about tobacco-control laws, should have carried a declaration from the start that the New Zealand Initiative’s financial supporters included tobacco companies.
The council rejected other aspects of the complaint, including concerns about its accuracy.
Stuff added a declaration to the column in February, more than two months after it was published. While the council commended Stuff for eventually adding the declaration, the complaint was upheld on the basis of the length of time it had taken and because it had initially denied that it should have added a declaration.
And a complaint about a Stuff column last October by Damien Grant about the Hamas attack on Israel was also upheld, on a point of comment and fact and because of the length of time taken to publish a correction.
The council said that Dr Imran Ali complained: “The assertion that Israel buys land from West Bank farmers is plainly incorrect. He provides material, including from Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, to support his view ... and says under international law there is no buying - ‘only theft, seizure and dispossession’.”
In consultation with Grant, Stuff later changed the word “buy” to “acquire”.
“It is a fine call, but the council upholds the complaint under Principle (4) on the word ‘buy’. It regards this as a one-sided statement, significant to the dispute, being presented as fact when there is no clear information supporting this contention.”
The council said Stuff, to its credit, published a correction and explanation - but this was done in January.
“The correction was made after the complaint had moved on to the council. The council believes a more timely correction was called for in this case. If Stuff had made the correction more promptly, the council would not have upheld [the complaint]. Two months was too long an interval.”
Editor-at-Large Shayne Currie is one of New Zealand’s most experienced senior journalists and media leaders. He has held executive and senior editorial roles at NZME including Managing Editor, NZ Herald Editor and Herald on Sunday Editor and has a small shareholding in NZME.
'I can imagine people being outraged that TVNZ signed a deal with me.'