News Corporations Rupert Murdoch AP
Rupert Murdoch’s Australian newspapers have launched a review of all editorial expenditure over the past three years to ”confirm that payments to contributors and other third parties were for legitimate services”.
John Hartigan, the chairperson and chief executive of News Limited, said he had ”absolutely no reason to suspect any wrongdoing”.
”However I believe it is essential that we can all have absolute confidence that ethical work practices are a fundamental requirement of employment at News Limited,” he said.
The review will have an ”independent element” according to the chair of the Australian Press Council, Professor Julian Disney. He said discussions about the nature of that element had been taking place since Monday and further discussions were expected on Thursday.
”I’ve also indicated to News Limited that I think they should announce a timeline for the completion of the review and announce as soon as possible what that timeline will be,” he said.
Paper chase
News Limited is an Australian subsidiary of News Corporation and owns eight of the 12 major daily newspapers in Australia, including the only national newspaper, the Australian. It also owns Sunday newspapers and a large number of regional and suburban papers. In three state capitals — Adelaide, Brisbane and Hobart — the only major daily paper is Murdoch-owned.
Hartigan said attempts by some Australian media outlets, commentators and politicians to connect the phone-hacking scandal in the UK with News Limited’s conduct in Australia were ”offensive and wrong”.
He cited examples including a major television news bulletin report that News Limited executives were ”suspects in the phone hacking scandal” (subsequently apologised for and corrected); a call by a federal senator for the government to investigate whether News Limited was engaging in phone hacking; and accusations that News Limited did not disclose its code of conduct and its journalists were unaware of it, which he described as false.
”However erroneous the allegations, I believe it is important to deal with these perceptions constructively,” Hartigan said.
He said every worldwide employee of News Corp had recently received a copy of the updated standard of business in conduct and they were already posted on the News Corp website and intranet.
Ludicrous assertions
Hartigan said he had asked for his divisional managers to publish the editorial code on each of the News Limited websites to ”neutralise even the most ludicrous assertions that we are somehow afraid to disclose it”.
Disney said he thought it unlikely Australian newspapers had been employing tactics similar to those of the News of the World, in part because competition between Australian tabloids was not as great.
”I think there are very good reasons to think it’s unlikely to be as bad here but the role of the Press Council is not to be complacent and we won’t be,” he said. — guardian.co.uk