Meme of the Week

Found on X/Twitter

Six months before the loss of government & his prime mininstership, sinophobe Scott Morrison signed Australia up to the tripartite AUKUS security pact & now those in the mainstream media who backed him whilst in office are beginning to beat the war drums

 

CEO former Australian citizen Rupert Murdoch, News Corp:

The Australian, 14 March 2023

‘It’s more than one plus one plus one’, from the pen of Canberra Bureau Chief Joe Kelly

…..“The sum of the three is more than one plus one plus one in this case,” Mr Albanese said.

“And I think that the co-operation we’ve had is really exciting. “We see that this is an investment in our capability. At the same time, of course, we’re investing in our relationships in the region as well.

“And I’ve been talking with other leaders in the region, as well, explaining our position. And it’s been well-received and understood why we’re doing this. It builds on our long-term relationship.” Mr Sunak said the deal was “about our commitment to the Pacific region, which, even though it’s geographically a long way from where we are, it’s important in a way to demonstrate our commitment to the values that we hold dear as countries.” Mr Albanese began his day with a walk alongside Chief of Navy Mark Hammond, declaring: “It’s a new dawn in San Diego, and it will be a new dawn in Australian defence policy tomorrow.” Before his trip to the US for the AUKUS announcement, Mr Sunak expressed concern about China’s future direction and role in the international system.

“It’s a country with fundamentally different values to ours, and I think over the last few years it’s become increasingly authoritarian at home and assertive abroad,” the British Prime Minister was quoted as saying in a report in The Wall Street Journal.

“It’s behaviour suggests it has the intention – but also its actions show it is interested in reshaping the world order. And that’s the crux of it.” Mr Sunak told The Wall Street Journal that threats to security were increasing. “The world has become a more volatile place,” he said. “What we need to do as allies is out-cooperate and out-compete our adversaries.” …..

‘Epoch-defining challenge’, from the pen of North Asia correspondent Will Glasgow

The hugely expensive project to acquire “world-leading” nuclear submarine capability – likely to cost hundreds of billions of dollars – is a key plank in the response by America and its allies to the massive build-up of the capabilities of China’s People’s Liberation Army over the past decade. Beijing last week further ramped up military spending by more than 7 per cent to more than $330bn. There is widespread support for the AUKUS project in Taipei. Lo Chih-Cheng, a member of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, said Taiwan’s government saw the security pact as part of a crucial effort to change Beijing’s calculus on ever using force in an attempt to bring the self-ruled island under Communist Party rule.

“Your decision to acquire nuclear submarines and to build up strength in your defence capabilities is conducive to redressing the imbalance that is happening now in the region,” said Mr Lo, a government member of Taiwan’s foreign affairs and national security committee. “We may not be able to stop China’s continuing military ­expansion, but it is imperative for us to stop the continuation of this kind of military imbalance.” Taiwan’s main opposition party, the Kuomintang (KMT), also welcomed the submarine acquisition. “We welcome measures to address the future balance of power in the western Pacific. And we would like to see a stronger Western alliance in terms of military capability and technology,” said the KMT’s top international adviser Alexander Huang….

The Age, 14 March 2023:

A partnership on the front foot, from the pen of International editor Peter Hartcher

Australia-India relations are thriving, driven by a mutual mistrust of China and shared economic self-interest.

Among the countries this week raising their voices against Australia's plan for nuclear-propelled submarines, you will not hear India, the world's most populous nation and fastest growing major economy….

"India did not object to AUKUS when it was announced," explains a leading Indian strategic analyst, C. Raja Mohan, because "it had no reason to. Stronger deterrence against China on the east is welcome for India," says the senior fellow of the Asia Society Policy Institute.

If you wondered why Australia's relations with India are suddenly booming - beyond the stale comforts of curry, cricket and the Commonwealth - the shared imperative of deterring the Chinese Communist Party's adventurism is key. That is the only reason Australia is arming itself with nuclear-propelled submarines…..

CEO former Liberal federal treasurer Peter Costello, Nine Entertainment Co: 

The Canberra Times, 14 March 2023

Be alert and alarmed, but don't be duped on China, from the pen of columnist Crispen Hill

Australians should take special heed of the analysis of the noted defence strategist Peter Jennings and then draw the exact opposite conclusion from his about what should be done.

Jennings, who for 10 years was executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute and was a deputy secretary of the Department of Defence, was one of five defence experts lined up by the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age in a series titled Red Alert. Its aim was to provide a more public discussion about Australia's defence needs than what will come out of the secretive Defence Strategic Review. And it was widely taken up by other media.

The five's conclusion was to expect war with China sooner rather than later because China was determined to take over Taiwan by force if necessary. The US would then move militarily to defend Taiwan and Australia would have to join in.

Jennings pointed out that in the first 72 hours, China could fire missiles (with or without nuclear warheads) on the naval fleet bases in Sydney and Perth, on RAAF bases near Brisbane and Darwin, and on communications bases near Alice Springs and Exmouth, among other targets.

The five concluded that war with China was almost inevitable and Australia needed an urgent massive upgrade and spend on its military and must maintain and strengthen its alliance with the US.

Those conclusions defy logic. Surely if Australian cities are going to be bombed because we are mad enough to follow the US blindly into a conflict that has nothing to do with us, the better course of action would be not to follow the US into that war and to loosen the ties with the US so that Australia could have its own defence policy and aims.

And the main aim should be to avoid war…..

BACKGROUND

X-Services News Pty Ltd

Australian Veteran News, 1 December 2021:

Made in Taiwan: Scott Morrison has concocted a phony war with China to take to the next election from the pen of Leo DiAngelo Fisher

“Even as Australia licks its wounds from the ignominy of the fruitless war in Afghanistan, arguably Australia’s most pointless war, the Morrison government is paving the way for a costlier, deadlier and even more contentious conflagration. This time the trumped up military foe is China….

Antagonising China – never a difficult task – has been a hallmark of the Morrison government. At first blush this might easily be attributed to the government’s diplomatic and foreign policy ineptitude. And there is that. Morrison is not a deep thinker on most fronts and especially when it comes to foreign affairs. This is a government that has wantonly sidelined diplomats and policy experts within the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade – how else to explain the AUKUS debacle? – in the belief that every decision by a government is political and in the moment.

There is none so one-dimensionally political as Scott Morrison. Morrison is not a prime minister troubled by the “vision thing”. His vision rarely extends beyond the next set of headlines. For Morrison, each day is a stepping stone to the next election.

That is the only prism through which the Morrison government’s incessant goading of China can be viewed. Australia’s historical bogeyman of choice, the “yellow peril”, has been reprised with unblushing enthusiasm by this government.

The Morrison government has deliberately and relentlessly fanned tensions with China: the more it riles China, the angrier China becomes, the more tangible the threat of war becomes.

Dutton used his recent National Press Club address to raise the prospect of war with China over the future of Taiwan.

Under Dutton’s Doomsday scenario, an “aggressive” China is poised to invade Taiwan, which it considers a renegade territory. Left unchallenged, an emboldened China would inevitably seek to wrest control of the disputed Senkaku Islands, currently administered by Japan, in the East China Sea.

“If Taiwan is taken, surely the Senkakus are next,” Dutton gratuitously speculated with overtones of the discredited “domino theory” of the 1950s and 60s, which mired the West, including Australia, in futile conflicts in Indochina.

Such was the ominous tenor of Dutton’s address as he mounted the case against China.

Cartoons of the Week

 

Mark David

Peter Broelman

David Rowe

David Pope

Media diversity and media monopolies' impact on Australian democracy are again under the microscope at today's Senate public hearing - where Sky News CEO will be asked to answer questions concerning News Corps influence

In June 2019 News Corp Australasia had ruled out any move by Rupert Murdoch's multinational media conglomerate to acquire a free-to-air television channel in Australia.

However by May 2021 a multi-year agreement had been signed between Sky News Australia (operated by Australian News Channel Pty Ltd a News Corp subsidiary) and media company Southern Cross Austereo (SCA) for a 24-hour Sky News channel to broadcast in regional markets.

The free-to-air Sky News Regional channel was launched on 1 August 2021 and broadcasts to SCA’s 17 regional markets across Victoria, Southern NSW and Queensland including Cairns, Townsville, Sunshine Coast, Canberra, Wollongong, Wagga Wagga, Orange, Bendigo and Ballarat, as well as in WIN Network’s NNSW regional markets Northern NSW, Griffith, NSW and South Australia.

Sky News Regional carries all the Sky News regular rightwing commentators, including Andrew Bolt, Peta Credlin, Alan Jones, Rita Panahi, Rowan Dean, Paul Murray, Chris Kenny, Laura Jayes, Kieran Gilbert and Sharri Markson as well as broadcasting a three-hour breakfast show.

It would appear that the 'Sky After Dark'  format pushing conspiracy theories, misinformation, barely disguised Coalition propaganda and hard right political figures - which replicates the U.S. Fox News format - has carried over to the new channel. 

On 11 November 2020, the Australian Senate referred an Inquiry into the state of media diversity, independence and reliability in Australia to the Senate Environment and Communications References Committee.

It came on the heels of a a petition to Parliament signed by more than 500,000 people which called for a royal commission into media diversity.

This Senate Inquiry has received 3,659 submissions and, today will hear evidence from Google Australia, Sky News Australia, former prime minister Kevin Rudd, Depart. of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Communications, Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), and the Victorian Branch of the United Firefighters Union.

To date News Corp co-chairman Lachlan Murdoch has refused the Inquiry’s invitation to appear before it. Instead CEO of Sky News Australia Paul Whittaker will be appearing before the Inquiry today.

Apparently presenters Alan Jones, Rita Panahi and Rowan Dean have agreed to appear before the Inquiry and answer questions.

It is the opinion of more than one political commentator that Sky News Australia was an active player in the sustained push within the Liberal Party to oust Malcolm Turnbull as Australian Prime Minister.

Sky News Australia is already on the radar of major Internet platforms and social media - on the same day that Sky News Regional was launched YouTube announced it was suspending the Sky News account for seven days due to the COVID-19 misinformation it was pedalling.

Sustained concerns about the dominance of News Corp in the media industry hit a nerve last month when Fox News threatened to take the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) to court concerning the content of a "Four Corners" program titled FOX & THE BIG LIE.

Both former prime minister Kevin Rudd and GetUp! continue to voice concerns that the new Sky News Regional channel will be shaped by Rupert Murdoch into a southern hemisphere version of that toxic misinformation and rightwing propaganda U.S. television channel, Fox News.

Malcolm Turnbull, another former prime minister, has also voiced concerns about the closeness of News Corp, including Fox News, to authoritarian and conservative governments.

“..the Murdoch media are much more influential within the coalition than they are in the electorate at large, just like Fox News in the States is much more influential among Republican voters than it is in the electorate at large……

The point is they are, I think, the single most influential political player in Australia but they are unelected and they are utterly unaccountable. That is what we're talking about. They do not hold themselves to traditional journalistic standards of accuracy and balance and so forth.

They would say, 'Oh look, it's a business model. We've got a percentage of the population who love being told this stuff and they like the extreme political views and so that's what we're going to do.'

Fox News in the States is commercially very successful. But that is not a justification that we can tolerate if the consequences are so much damage to our democracy”.

News Corp in Australia is hedging its bets when it comes to 'anti-vaxx' sentiment now the NSW Delta Variant Outbreak really starts to bite

 

The Guardian, 29 July 2021:

The Daily Telegraph has ended Alan Jones’s regular column amid controversy about his Covid-19 commentary, including calling the NSW chief health officer Kerry Chant a village idiot on his Sky News program.

There has been apparent tension inside News Corp Australia between the anti-lockdown Sky After Dark commentators like Jones and Andrew Bolt and the Holt Street newspapers, which have been promoting vaccination and criticising the “freedom” protest in Sydney.

The Daily Telegraph editor Ben English told Jones he was dropping his column because it didn’t “resonate” with readers.

Jones, 80, says he doesn’t believe his columns don’t resonate with readers.

“If the argument has been it’s not resonating, I don’t have to defend myself,” Jones told The Sydney Morning Herald.

“Have a look at Sky News YouTube, Sky News Facebook and Alan Jones Facebook and you can see. The same column that I write for the Tele goes up on my Facebook page.

“The public can check it for themselves. 35 years at top of the radio - and I don’t resonate with the public? Honestly.”

Asked about Jones’s attacks on Chant, the NSW health minister Brad Hazzard told reporters at a press conference that a lot of people “don’t base their decisions in science, or evidence”.

“All I will say is we are in a one-in-100-year pandemic,” he said. “The community need to understand the decisions are taken as best as possible on the basis of evidence and science to keep us safe.”

Jones’s final Telegraph column last week criticised Australia’s response to Covid-19, which he argues is no worse than the flu for healthy people.

On Monday on Sky News, Jones launched an attack on Chant, calling her “dumb” and “out of touch”. “How many villages are missing their idiot?” he said.

The former 2GB broadcaster also defended the Sydney protesters…..

AUSTRALIAN POLITICAL POLLING: Compare The Pair

 

Oh what a difference a year and one global pandemic make......

19 July 2020

18 July 2021

Newspoll is an Australian opinion polling brand established in 1985, exclusively published by News Corp’s The Australian newspaper and administered by UK based market research and data analytics group, YouGov. The business name "Newspoll" is registered to Nationwide News Pty Ltd a subsidiary of News Corp.

News Corp's The Daily Examiner continues to die the death of a thousand cuts

The Clarence Valley had a resident population of est. 51,730 souls in 2020.

Up until mid 2020 it was home to three print newspapers, The Daily Examiner, Coastal Views and the Clarence Valley Independent. 

Only the 'Independent' remains as a print newspaper with a dedicated website, as the other two were part of a media purchase made by foreign-owned News Corp Inc. and these print mastheads have been allowed to wither and die.

In July 2021 News Corp boasts The Daily Examiner has a digital Facebook following of est. 20,747 people (presumably worldwide), an Instagram following of 1,806 and, a Twitter account showing one published tweet from 2009 with a following of only 105.

There is of course no longer a print circulation or a presence on Press Reader because Rupert Murdoch quickly killed off this newspaper which had been the purveyor of news from 1859 to mid 2020. Even its dedicated web address now redirects to a section of The Daily Telegraph website called “Grafton News”. 

One is left to wonder when the ghost of The Daily Examiner masthead will fade from the Internet completely. 

The corporate planned lingering death of a news outlet is sad to witness.

A virulent cancer lodged in the the heart of Australian society - News Corp

U.S. citizen Keith Rupert Murdoch
Media magnate & founder of News Corp
IMAGE: Google Images

The New Daily, 12 April 2021:

As the federal Senate convenes its latest hearing on the inquiry into media diversity, with former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull as its headline act on Monday, it has been revealed News Corp owns nearly 60 per cent of the metro and national print media market.

The company also earns 40 per cent of TV revenues, and is part of a profitable trio controlling a mind-boggling 90 per cent of metro radio licences…..

On the eve of the Senate inquiry, a study by University of Sydney academics found how densely Australia’s media ownership is concentrated.

“News Corp is the unchallenged dominant player,” wrote Associate Professor of Communication Benedetta Brevini and PhD candidate Michael Ward.

“The predominance of News Corp in cross-media settings is unprecedented in liberal democracies.”

The report, commissioned by activist group GetUp!, found News Corp had a 59 per cent share in the metro and national print media markets, when measured by readership.

The authors said that compared to just 25 per cent in 1984.

Nine Entertainment, which owns the former Fairfax papers including the Sydney Morning Herald, has “a combined 23 per cent readership share”, the report details.

“The dominance of News Corp and Nine’s media ownership extends beyond print to other media platforms,” the authors said.

“Just three corporations – News Corp, Nine, and Southern Cross Media (and their associated entities) – control almost 90 per cent of the lucrative metropolitan radio licences across the country.”

That’s in addition to the 40 per cent of total Australian television revenue that News Corp earns, when taking into account free-to-air and subscription revenues.

The authors note this is “almost double that of second-place holder Nine”.....

The full GetUp! report is at https://d68ej2dhhub09.cloudfront.net/2810-GetUp_-_Who_Controls_Our_Media_.pdf

The Daily Examiner presence in the Clarence Valley further diminished

 

In 2016 the Australian Consumer Competition Commission (ACCC) gave the nod to U.S. based News Corp’s purchase of Australian Regional Media (ARM) from APN News & Media.

The Daily Examiner print newspaper and news website were part of that purchase.

On 27 June 2020 after 161 years of continuous editions, The Daily Examiner was printed and distributed for the last time, as more than 100 regional newspapers were sent digital by the new owner of ARM.

The masthead’s paywalled website remained as www.dailyexaminer.com.au.

However, recently 'rationalisation'  has seen this masthead website disappear and all traffic now redirected to https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/grafton.

This redirection to The Daily Telegraph is occurring across many NSW & Qld regional news websites held by News Corp.

In 2019-20 News Corp reported global losses of US$1.5bn with total revenue falling by 11 per cent, while Australian revenue showed a 16 per cent decline. 

Last year News Corp shed a total of 875 editorial, journalist, photographer and designer positions across its Australian print and digital news outlets.

Tweets of the Week

The Australien Government has made an ad about the new media legislation it just passed, and it's surprisingly honest and informative! pic.twitter.com/iD5KRenxGT

— theJuiceMedia (@thejuicemedia) February 25, 2021

Who else needs to see this? pic.twitter.com/Y2B66ZOWaI

— Kailas Wild 🐨 (@kailaswild) March 1, 2021

Quotes of the Week

 

“ Since the start of the 46th Parliament, there have been about 538 divisions in the lower house. Just 18 of those divisions have occurred to pass legislation. A staggering 233 have occurred to prevent Opposition MPs giving speeches. That means government MPs have voted more times to silence their political opponents than they have to make laws – by a factor of 13.”  [Labor MP for Watson Tony Burke, writing in The New Daily, 28 January 2021]

“ For those concerned about the cumulative impact of Fox News in America on the radicalisation of US politics, the same template is being followed with Sky News in Australia. We will see its full impact in a decade’s time…..At its core, it has delegitimised the twin pillars of the enlightenment: empirical fact and rational argument. The assault by Fox News on both as “fake news”, the culture that validates the world of “alternative facts” and the adulation of far-right “opinion” as somehow co-equal with (or superior to) scientifically established truths, all undermine the foundations of an informed citizenry in a functioning democracy. It also creates a political environment that is increasingly receptive to the world of fantasy, conspiracy, identity politics and extremist religious views no longer anchored in any common foundation of evidence and reason. The result is not just the creation of two warring political tribes based on different concepts of economic interests and social values, but two different conceptual worlds that can no longer communicate with each other because they no longer speak a common language. Murdoch’s Fox News has been central to this process of dividing the way in which Americans talk with each other for nearly 30 years. Most importantly, its net effect has been to delegitimise the democracy itself in the eyes of many Americans. It has created a radically divided country where the possibility of rational compromise has become progressively impossible between the warring tribes that Murdoch has sought successfully to create. This weakening of the American democracy, and the fracturing of the republic on which it rests, has dealt more damage to the global standing, influence and power of the United States than the combined efforts of the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China. Murdoch’s template for America, culminating in the political crisis of 6 January 2021. It’s a template which Murdoch has believed would maximise his personal, business and ideological interests – by demonising the agency of government; undermining essential government regulation; and most importantly by minimising corporate and personal tax. Trump achieved all three. It’s also Murdoch’s vision for Australia.”  [Former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, excerpt from written submission to Australian Parliament, Senate Standing Committee on Environment and Communications, Inquiry into Media Diversity in Australia]

Murdoch and Costello's "recycled press releases by government spin doctors being passed-off as journalism or entertainment clickbait pinched from elsewhere and dressed up as original news content, isn’t going to cut it"

The Northern Rivers Times, 10 September 2020:

If there was ever an indicator that the media is not a one-size-fits-all model, it’s happening right now in Australia. 

And given the monopoly one media organisation has in this country, it’s a pretty reasonable assumption (on the author’s part at least, having been part of said organisation up until a couple of months ago), that they are driving the campaign to make online giants Google and Facebook pay to use Australian news on their platforms. 

But who exactly will benefit from charging Facebook and Google? All Australian media, or just those luddites struggling to implement their particular business model in today’s online media climate. 

Despite what the Federal Government, or more aptly their friend Newscorp, might be proposing to challenge the Facebook and Google news sharing platforms, not all news being shared is created equal..... 

While the media industry preaches that paying for journalism is a must to ensure quality and accountability remains at its bedrock, it’s no guarantee you are going to get either if you do. 

Recycled press releases by government spin doctors being passed-off as journalism or entertainment clickbait pinched from elsewhere and dressed up as original news content, isn’t going to cut it. 

Expecting people to pay for what they can read for free elsewhere isn’t going to cut it. Demanding trust rather than delivering it, isn’t going to cut it. 

Original, well-researched, unbiased, investigative journalism might. And if it doesn’t, well what’s left hardly constitutes journalism does it....

Read the full article here at Page 5.

A grand gesture by James Murdoch which changes nothing on the Australian media landscape

@mjrowland68

James Rupert Jacob Murdoch has decided to leave his father's toxic media organisation.

The Hollywood Reporter, 31 July 2020:

Getty

Former 21st Century Fox CEO James Murdoch has resigned from the board of News Corp., the parent company of the Wall Street Journal. 

In a letter of resignation filed Friday afternoon, Murdoch wrote: "My resignation is due to disagreements over certain editorial content published by the Company’s news outlets and certain other strategic decisions." 

James Murdoch had been on News Corp.'s board of directors since 2013. News Corp. is one of two media companies controlled by James' father Rupert Murdoch and the Murdoch family. 

The other is Fox Corp., the parent company of Fox News and the Fox broadcast network, which was created after 21st Century Fox sold its entertainment assets to The Walt Disney Company. 

Murdoch stepped down as Fox CEO following the sale, with his brother Lachlan Murdoch becoming CEO, and father Rupert becoming co-chairman. 

News Corp., which owns the Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones, New York Post, News U.K. and newspaper and TV assets in Australia, is run by CEO Robert Thomson. 

After leaving the Fox fold, Murdoch started his own company, Lupa Systems, which has invested in technology companies and other firms. 

Lupa Systems has acquired stakes in Vice Media, tech startup Betalab, and is pursuing a stake in MCH Group, the parent company of the Art Basel fair. 

Lupa Systems and Joe Marchese's Attention Capital also acquired a majority stake in Tribeca Enterprises last year, the parent organization of the Tribeca Film Festival. 

In a joint statement released after the letter was made public, Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch said "We’re grateful to James for his many years of service to the company. We wish him the very best in his future endeavors.”

Earlier this year James Murdoch and his wife Kathryn issued a joint statement expressing disappointment with the level of climate change denial found in News Corp’s Australian outlets.

James Murdoch became chief executive of British Sky Broadcasting in 2003 at the age of 30, when his father Rupert was still chairman. 

By 2012 after the News of the World phone hacking scandal and the subsequent Leveson Inquiry, U.K. media watchdog Ofcom declared James' ''conduct in relation to events at NGN repeatedly fell short of the conduct to be expected of him as a chief executive officer and chairman'' when he was running News Corp's News Group Newspapers.

At that time James was also a director of British Sky Broadcasting Group as well as a director of News Corporation.

He apparently stepped back from any day-to-day roles within the family business at the end of 2018.

His resignation does not imply that he has sold or intends to sell his shareholdings in News Corp or Disney.

Climate change denier Ian Plimer in the news again

YouTube GWPF video snapshot

Former mining geologist Ian Plimer (left) is nothing if not persistent. 

North Coast Voices has been noting his biased, inaccurate & frequently irrational opinions since December 2008.


This was the fall-out from one of his articles published nine months ago.

The Guardian, 24 July 2020:

An op-ed by Prof Ian Plimer in the Australian, which was condemned as blatantly false by climate scientists, has been found to have breached standards by the Australian Press Council. In November, his column titled “Let’s not pollute minds with carbon fears” argued that there “are no carbon emissions. If there were, we could not see because most carbon is black. Such terms are deliberately misleading, as are many claims.”

The article also referred to the “fraudulent changing of past weather records” and “unsubstantiated claims polar ice is melting”, as well as “the ignoring of data that shows Pacific islands and the Maldives are growing rather than being inundated”.

Despite a chorus of criticism at the time, the former editor John Lehmann defended Plimer’s article, saying “his voice is one of many which are important in the mix”.

In a lengthy adjudication the Oz was forced to publish on page two on Friday, the press council said the article contained inaccurate and misleading material in its claims that the Bureau of Meteorology had fraudulently changed weather records and that Plimer’s claims that there was no evidence polar ice was melting were misleading.

The newspaper breached two of the general principles of reporting: ensuring factual material is accurate (principle 1) and ensuring facts are presented with reasonable fairness and balance and opinion is based on fact (principle 3).

The council found that while it would have preferred Plimer’s links to the mining industry were disclosed in the column, the Australian did not breach guidelines in not disclosing because Plimer’s “past or present directorships of mining companies and advocacy in the debate around climate change were so well known” that it was not required.

Plimer is a professor of geology and well-known climate change denier who has served as a director of a number of mining firms, including Gina Rinehart’s Roy Hill Holdings and Queensland Coal Investments.

In reviewing the article last November, University of New South Wales professor Katrin Meissner wrote: “This article is an impressive collation of the well known, scientifically wrong, and overused denier arguments. It is ideologically motivated and, frankly, utter nonsense.”….