Most people agree that the way the BBC Panorama program “Trump: A Second Chance?” edited excerpts from Donald Trump’s speech to MAGA supporters before the riot on Capitol Hill on 6 January 2021 was unethical.  Even deceptive.

No one seems to have noticed that the man who exposed the inappropriate edit did something very similar in his leaked memorandum to the BBC Board.

But the usual Australian critics have been happy to jump on the British bandwagon, accusing the ABC of deceptive conduct and calling for inquiries into its impartiality.

Last week Alumni director Jonathan Holmes wrote in the Nine newspapers that the BBC’s critics had a point. But he’s now wondering whether the scandal that led to the resignation of the BBC’s two most senior executives was, after all, a political hatchet job.

National Response to Islamophobia: A Strategic Framework for Inclusion, Safety and Prosperity. Report by Australia’s special envoy to combat Islamophobia

On 12 September 2025, Aftab Malik, Australia’s Special Envoy to Combat Islamophobia, released his report entitled  National Response to Islamophobia: A Strategic Framework for Inclusion, Safety and Prosperity. The report has made a number of comments on the role of the media. A brief summary and comments by ABC Alumni chair, Michael Ward are provided below.

Michael Ward, Chair, ABC Alumni, provides insights into the ABC’s social media presence and the increasing significance of social media for news media.

On 20 August 2025 the ABC published its new guidelines on public comment by ABC workers. They were commissioned by the ABC’s new Managing Director, Hugh Marks, following the highly damaging Antoinette Lattouf affair. Their principal author, ABC Editorial Director Gavin Fang, discussed them with members of the Board of ABC Alumni prior to publication.

Alumni director Jonathan Holmes believes that, contrary to a lot of third-party commentary, the new guidelines offer more protection to ABC workers than existed before.

More than 80 per cent of Australians are now getting their information and content from American social media and video streaming services. It’s impacting on the number of Australian stories we see and hear as well as damaging what has been a vibrant Australian film, radio and television industry.

The Albanese Government is stalling on its decision to regulate Australian content on streaming platforms and local producers and advocates are worried that the lobbying power of the streaming giants is holding sway.

Quentin Dempster argues it’s imperative to fight for Australian voices and stories on the new digital platforms and to resist the Americanization of Aussie culture.

This article was first published in Pearls and Irritations, John Menadue’s Public Policy Journal on 18 August 2024.

During the referendum campaign, and since the overwhelming No vote, a chorus of respected journalists and media academics have declared that the Australian mass media, very much including the ABC, failed in their duty to the Australian public by slavishly adhering to the concept of ‘balance’, and by not calling out misinformation as and when they reported it. This is not the usual claim of bias by the Murdoch media or the No campaign: most of these critics clearly supported Yes. Among them, Mark Kenny, of the Canberra Times and the ANU’s Australian Studies Institute; Chris Warren, former Secretary of the Media Alliance, now at Crikey; Denis Muller of the University of Melbourne’s Centre for Advancing Journalism, in The Conversation; Nikki Savva in a recent column in the Nine newspapers; and the ABC’s staff-elected Board director, and 7.30’s chief political correspondent, Laura Tingle. [Some links may be paywalled]

ABC Alumni does not agree that the ABC’s journalists made a bad job of an all-but impossible task: reporting fairly on both sides of the Referendum debate, while simultaneously distinguishing between information, genuine opinion and outright misinformation. And the Share of Voice count, which the ABC has used for decades in elections, is a useful tool for assessing, and if necessary demonstrating, that the ABC’s coverage has been fair.

But as ABC Alumni Board director and former ABC Editorial Director ALAN SUNDERLAND points out in this article, Voice Tracker is a tool, and ‘balance’ is a concept, that can be misused, misunderstood, or simply abused.

A version of this article first appeared in the Nine Newspapers on Friday October 30.

by Jonathan Holmes

Nine Entertainment, Chris Masters, Nick McKenzie and David Wroe won a famous victory [appeal pending, see below] in the ‘defamation trial of the century’ against Ben Roberts-Smith, VC. Now Masters and McKenzie have each written books about the Flawed Hero who Crossed the Line between lawful and unlawful killing in war.   

ABC ALUMNI chair Jonathan Holmes reviews the books, and reflects on the lessons they have to teach us about investigative journalism, truth-telling, and the cost of a crucial victory.

The controversial ACMA finding on the Four Corners two-part program, ‘Fox and the Big Lie’, has again highlighted the shortcomings of the media standards regulation processes in Australia. But what to do about it? Alumni director Alan Sunderland has spent several years considering this issue. Here’s his view.

The recent ACMA ruling on ABC Four Corners’ two-part program ‘Fox and the Big Lie’ sets a dangerous precedent, says ABC Alumni chair Jonathan Holmes. In a letter to ACMA chair Nerida O’Loughlin, Mr Holmes strongly argues that, in view of the judgments it has made in investigating the program, the ACMA cannot be taken seriously as an arbiter of journalistic practice. You can read the Alumni letter here. 

Last week, the ACT’s Director of Public Prosecutions announced that there would be no retrial of Bruce Lehrmann, because it would pose a “significant and unacceptable risk to the life of the complainant”, Brittany Higgins.

It’s a classic example of the dilemma that confronts our courts in the trial of alleged sexual offenders. The accused is entitled to the presumption of innocence, until proved guilty beyond reasonable doubt. He or she is also entitled to decline to give evidence – the “right to silence”. However, to plant a reasonable doubt in the minds of a jury, defence counsel will inevitably attempt to discredit the evidence of the complainant, who is usually the only other witness to the alleged offence. The result is too often a gruelling cross-examination that can retraumatise already vulnerable people, whether or not they avail themselves of the right to remain anonymous.

That is the issue with which Louise Milligan grapples in her 2020 book, Witness. It was the issue about which she was invited to speak to the Women Lawyers Association of the ACT at their gala dinner on 21 October this year. It is a matter of obvious public interest. But Milligan has now found herself under attack, not only in The Australian and on Sky News, but in the Commonwealth parliament, for things she did not say and does not believe.

This is News Corporation’s version of “cancel culture”, argues Jonathan Holmes – a phenomenon it has so often condemned.