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Much ado about Djokovic

Djokovic-tennis-Covid-19 — Image: Rod Laver Arena, Melbourne Leau Smith/pixabay.com

Some journalism traditions die hard and fortunately, the one that persists in quality publications is to separate news from opinion. The labels “Opinion” or “Comment” ought to accompany any writing which draws on facts but allows the writer to comment and interpret. (Ed: Like FOMM).

Outspoken Australian journalist and commentator Van Badham was introduced this way in the New York Times on Sunday.

“Opinion – guest essay by Van Badham.”

The headline (which tradition decrees is always written by someone else), said: Novak Djokovic got the boot. Australians are thrilled.

The headline set the tone, in part by using Aussie parlance and then with the partially substantiated claim “Australians are thrilled”.

This was drawn from a poll cited by Badham that 83% of 60,000 respondents were in favour of Djokovic being booted. (FOMM opinion – But wait, that means 10,200 were not in favour…Oh right, it’s an opinion piece).

The labelling of opinion pieces is an industry practice that cuts both ways. It gives readers a first-up warning that what they are about to read is just that – somebody’s opinion. At the same time, the disclaimer allows Badham freedom to use the acrimony around Novak Djokovic’s visa cancellation to highlight the government’s (mis)handling of Covid-19.

“There’s a familiar pattern of government miscommunication and ineptitude unfolding around Djokovic that sadly reminds us of our brief and squandered advantage over the virus,” Badham wrote.

Not to be outdone, The Age also latched on to the term ‘the boot’ which is Aussie for being fired, kicked out of a pub or sent to sleep it off in the spare room. Writer Peter Schmigel ‘put in the boot’, which is Aussie for kicking a man when he’s down.

In a rare departure from form, Sky News said the Novak Djokovic saga had “damaged the government’s reputation”. Sky News host Rita Panahi said Djokovic had essentially been deported for “thought crimes”. In her Behind the News programme (a review of headlines on the topic), Panahi said the government “cynically made this decision with an eye on the polls”. What was that about my enemy’s enemy?

These obvious comment pieces reminded me that a reader suggested I write about ‘proper’ journalism. How do you separate well-researched, balanced news reporting from the bias of commentators of the right and the left, he asked? OK, done that.

The Djokovic story was hard to ignore. The media swarmed on it like wild bees drawn to a hole in a weatherboard house. January is usually a fallow field for the skeleton crews left in newsrooms, Many people are on holidays, including those who feed stories to the media on a daily basis. Suddenly, though, there was drama on the central court – a rare Sunday sitting of the full bench of the Federal Court involving the world’s Number 1 tennis player. Ask people who have been waiting two years for a court hearing what they think about that.

Journalists rostered to work on Sundays rarely have such a prize on their shift. As usual, radio and television news had the best of it.

There is rarely anything left for the Monday papers, except for targeted news released by organisations fond of exploiting the vacant space.

For example, the Queensland Government’s spin doctors tabled new research that demonstrated the disproportionate risk of remaining unvaccinated.

Independent news portal ‘InQueensland’ summed it up in one, 33-word lead paragraph.

“An unvaccinated person who contracts Covid-19 is 24 times more likely to end up fighting for their life in intensive care than someone who has had all three jabs, Queensland Health data shows.”

This introductory paragraph tells the reader in one sentence what the story is about. No need to read any more. Just retire to the water cooler and tell others. You can see the deft hand of old-school journos behind this opening para, wordy though it may be.

Health Minister Yvette D’Ath used this data to urge older Queenslanders to get their booster shot.

(Ed: we had ours on Wednesday).

The Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC) and other such organisations often release statements to the media on a Sunday for publication on Monday. It’s the slowest news day, so journalists hungry for a fresh angle can never resist. As the story usually relies on an official statement, it is difficult (on a Sunday evening) to track down someone to represent the other side.

John McCarthy, writing in On-line news publication ‘InQueensland’, reported on Monday that the ACCC had received 1800 complaints of retailers over-charging for rapid antigen tests. McCarthy cited a Chamber of Commerce and Industry survey, which showed that the lack of test kits as well as staff shortages were critical factors in the crippling of the supply chain..

This type of story will be ‘broken’ in the Monday newspapers and pounced upon by news-hungry radio and TV producers. Those breaking the story will have little opportunity to follow up, which becomes the role of radio news. While the ‘claims’ referred to are yet to be proven, they highlight the issue of price gouging over RAT’s (rapid antigen tests that can be done at home- for those unfamiliar with this Aussie acronym) and put a number on instances of (alleged) profiteering. I heard ACCC chairman Rod Sims expanding on this story later in the day on ABC news radio.

Sims said the level of pricing was “clearly outrageous”, citing media reports of as much as $500 for two tests (we paid $56 including postage for our pack of five kits, which is top of the wholesale price range).

The ACCC said there was an increase in the amount of RAT selling through service stations and convenience stores. They had become the source of many of the complaints it was receiving.

By publishing these claims, ‘InQueensland’ did radio and TV journalists a favour by pointing them to a couple of outlets (named in the report).

We sometimes describe this kind of story as “bees in a bottle” – give the jar a good shake and see what sort of noise they make.

It’s no wonder the more experienced journalists turn to commentary or analysis. The basic practice of news reporting can be quite tedious. It involves spending hours on the phone ‘doing the rounds’ and waiting, waiting for people to ring you back. In my day, the editor would probably not run your story if you did not have the other side. All too often now, the 24/7 news cycle forces media outlets to publish now and update later.

When reading news, it’s not a bad idea to separate hard news (two men died in a head on collision), from news like the ACCC report, that could become harder news once it progresses to prosecutions and hefty fines.

As for the label ‘Opinion’ or ‘Comment’, if it’s not there, write to the publisher and say that it ought to be.

In the case of writer Peter Schmigel’s ‘open letter’ rant about Novak Djokovic, the ‘Opinion’ label also allows news editors to deal with blow-back. “Don’t shoot the messenger,” they will tell irate tennis fans. They have reason to be irate – Schmigel (writing in Melbourne’s No 1 newspaper), agrees with the blokes down the pub – Novak’s a ‘boofhead’.

“The forms, mate, the forms. It would have been nice if you could have just filled in the forms right. You didn’t. Double fault. Maybe you should fire somebody – whether it’s the lawyers, the coaches, the agents, the masseurs, or your Dad, who tried to start World War Three on behalf of your backhand.

Or, maybe, just maybe, take some responsibility.”

(I particularly liked it when someone described Djokovic’s statement (that his staff member had filled in the paperwork incorrectly) as ‘the dog ate my homework’ excuse. Ed)

FROMM back pages

Country of origin labelling under review

counhtry-of-origin-labelling — Image: An example of what some might like to see in revised country of origin labelling: source The Conversation

I discovered only in the last year or so that up to 70% of ham and bacon sold in Australia is imported from Europe or the US. Your regular supermarket no doubt helps out by labelling pork products so you know what you are buying.

For example, ham off the bone is almost always produced in Australia. Cheaper cuts and processed ham and smallgoods may contain up to 70% of imported pork. Australian Pork Limited recently found that 10% of shoppers admitted they failed to check or were unaware of country-of-origin labelling.The survey was carried out to support an awareness campaign in South Australia.

While all fresh pork sourced and sold in Australia is locally grown, Australian Pork Limited CEO Margo Andrae urged shoppers to identify Australian ham and bacon products.

“Consumers should check the bar chart on the country-of-origin label, located under the green and gold kangaroo. The bar chart must be almost full or have a percentage of at least 90% Australian ingredients, to guarantee the pork is Australian.” Australian Pork Limited is one of many organisations which has made submissions to a review in 2020 of the country of origin labelling regime. The Department of Industry, Science, Energy and Resources was aiming to complete its report by July 2021, but so far it has not been publicly released.

Labelling laws were introduced in July 2018, after a furore surrounding a case in 2015 where consumers contracted Hepatitis A from frozen berries imported from China and Chile.

Country of origin (CoOL) labelling requires the food product to contain a label with information stating the percentage (by weight) which is (or is not) Australian made.

For example, a label might read : “Made in Australia from less than 25% Australian ingredients.” The ideal, for those who believe our food is best, are declarations like “made in Australia from 100% Australian ingredients” or “Grown in Australia”.

Consumer organisation Choice, which campaigned for CoOL labelling as early as 2015, also made a submission to the review, voicing concerns aired by subscribers.

“Consumers want to identify whether a product is local or not. However, if a product is not local or has overseas ingredients, consumers want to know the origin of these ingredients. Highlighting the proportion of Australian ingredients does not satisfy the statement ‘country of origin’ nor does it meet consumers’ expectations of food labels. For example, claims such as ‘Made in Australia from at least 25% Australian ingredients’ still leaves consumers in the dark as to where the remaining ingredients come from.”

Other improvements sought by those lobbying the department are to extend labelling to ‘non-priority foods’ which includes biscuits and snack food, confectionery, energy drinks, soft drinks, tea and coffee and bottled water. As you might expect, almost all of the 20,000 Choice subscribers surveyed for this submission said that knowing where the food and drink they buy comes from is important.

More than 90% of respondents use country of origin labelling to make decisions when buying food at the supermarket. About half said they use the labels “frequently” and 40% use it “every time”.

The CoOL scheme is administered by the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission (ACCC).

When you delve into this topic a little, it does not take long to find that imported foods take up a lot of shelf space in our supermarkets. This is particularly so for the Indian and Asian food shelves and the pasta and sauces section.

For example, when you wheel the trolley (with two wheels veering in opposite directions) into the fish aisle, here’s your dilemma.

Australia dropped out of the canned tuna business a decade ago, finding it too hard to compete with product from South East Asian countries. Countries like Thailand, where most of our canned tuna comes from, have geographical advantages over Australia and a low-cost processing and production chain.

As for canned salmon, sardines and the like, we go top shelf. We may have fallen for the advertising (bears fishing for salmon in fast-flowing Canadian rivers), but we figure the only difference between the pink or red salmon consumed in the wild by bears is that ours comes in a can (and our feet don’t get wet).

According to the Department of Agriculture, 70% of edible fish consumed in Australia is imported from Asia or New Zealand. This may sound arse-about, but Australia exports about half of its annual fisheries and aquaculture production by value ($1.5 billion in 2019-2020). A report by ABARES describes our export trade as “specialising in high unit value products for the growing Asian market”.

“Australia’s reputation as a reliable and high-quality supplier of high unit value fisheries products, and its proximity to Asia’s fast-growing seafood market, generally insulates Australia’s trade in fisheries products from longer-term shocks. The pandemic has caused some disruption to Australia’s usual trade, particularly for products that are highly export oriented, such as rock lobster and abalone.”

The Buy Australian Made campaign has its adherents, most subscribing to the philosophy that it creates and sustains local jobs. A friend became quite incensed recently on discovering that the can of evaporated milk she had bought was imported from Mexico. Irate, she rang the parent company to complain.

“Why can’t we make it here?” she said (to me).”

She has a point, when you consider that condensed milk is just dairy milk with the water removed and sugar added.

It wasn’t too hard to find out that we did indeed make both evaporated and condensed milk at a factory in Victoria. The owner, Nestle, announced the phased closure of the factory in August 2019, with the loss of 106 jobs.

General Manager Andrew McIver, reflecting on the decision to close and move production to Nestle’s overseas factories, said: “People just don’t buy tinned milk like they used to, and cheaper imports have eroded our business further.”

Dairy Australia says imported milk comprises about 2% of Australia’s dairy imports, mostly specialty cheeses from New Zealand and Europe.

Should we really care too much about where food comes from? Some years ago, I bought a packet of frozen peas from a supermarket, not even looking or thinking about country origin. I got the bag home and read “Produce of Poland” on the label. Then I checked the map and found that Poland is just 709 kms from Chernobyl, the site of a nuclear plant meltdown in 1986.

Said packet of peas came in handy when I injured my knee (against the corner of my desk), but eventually I threw it away.

There have been enough high profile incidents of food recalls over the years to raise our levels of awareness about the risk of contamination.

Food Standards Australia and New Zealand (FSANZ) says that food recalls averaged 76 a year between 2011 and 2020. While we are all aware of cases where recalled food was contaminated by salmonella, listeria and e coli, these are in the minority.

Almost half of the recalls in 2020 were foods with ‘undeclared allergens’ (e.g. milk, eggs, peanut). Of these recalls, just over half were imported food products. Anyone can sign up to FSANZ to receive food recall alerts

Should you be unfortunate enough to buy a recalled food products before it it removed from the shelf, the advice is to return it to the retailer for a full refund.

Or, like the peas from Poland, you could just chuck it out.

How the Nine Fairfax merger affects regional media

Did you know that the removal of Malcolm Turnbull as Prime Minister in August cost the taxpayer $4.5 million? Canberra Times journalist Latika Bourke revealed this in a news report, adding that the cost included $1.9 million, paid out to 35 former Prime Ministerial staffers. Crikey, I’m in the wrong business.

Labor’s finance spokesman Jim Chalmers told Bourke the sum was another cost to voters of the ‘meaningless’ leadership change.

“Scott Morrison can’t explain why Turnbull isn’t PM anymore and why taxpayers have to foot the bill for that.”

Chalmers (a former chief of staff to Wayne Swan) said 607 staff members’ employment changed as a result of Mr Turnbull’s removal as prime minister, with 136 staff terminated and the remaining 471 re-employed. The figures, which do not include the cost of the Wentworth by-election (approx $1.6m), emerged from a Senate estimates hearing.

Enjoy that little public interest vignette from the Canberra Times while you can. Nine is shopping around for a buyer. Nine does not want the Canberra Times because it does not have a paywall; people who might otherwise pay to read the Sydney Morning Herald or the Age have been getting their news for free from the Canberra Times, chief executive Hugh Marks told staff on Monday.

The Nine Fairfax merger means much of its regional assets will be sold – the key question being, to whom, as there are not many takers in this tightly-held media market. The same applies in New Zealand.

Kiwi columnist Bill Ralston observed in The New Zealand Listener (owned by Bauer Media), that the media industry is in the process of ‘collapsing into an untidy heap as advertising revenues and profits decline’.

Ralston was bemoaning the fate of local media outlets in the wake of the Nine Fairfax merger. Nine has already said it is not interested in the newspapers Fairfax owns in New Zealand.

If you have ever browsed a popular Kiwi website, stuff.co.nz, you may not know that Stuff/Fairfax also owns nine daily newspapers, a Sunday newspaper and New Zealand’s TV guide. Stuff also owns community newspapers, 28 of which they want to close or sell.

We’ve seen a rationalisation of (free) community titles and regional mastheads in Australia too. As you should know, Rupert Murdoch’s News Ltd bought all of the regional titles of Australian Regional Media in late 2016. This, added to the papers it already owned, delivered an absolute print media monopoly across Queensland.

News wasted no time syndicating Sky News conservative commentators including Andrew Bolt, Paul Murray, Peta Credlin and Alan Jones. A comrade in Toowoomba emailed me last year to say that the editorial space where once a column called Friday on My Mind appeared was now hosted by the aforementioned Mr Bolt.

AND WE ALL KNOW WHAT HE THINKS.

I was idly channel surfing late at night in a Rotorua motel when I stumbled upon Sky News Australia, where the hosts (Bolt, Credlin and Jones), were holding court about political events of the day.

Hold fast, my fair-minded side said, listen to what others have to say. By the time Alan Jones came on, with his scoffing dismissal of Liberal MP Julia Banks’s defection to the crossbench, I felt like the victim of a home invasion.

I switched briefly to Al Jazeera (Kiwis get a lot of free Sky channels), before finding respite in Hunting Aotearoa and a Mars Bar from the mini fridge.

So yes, it is wise to tune in and see what the right wing polemicists are saying. For example, at the time when the Kids off Nauru campaign was at its height, Paul Murray was writing in the Sunshine Coast Daily about indigenous children and venereal disease. He wasn’t saying one issue was more important than the other, he just chose that one instead.

Amidst the Nine Fairfax merger, leftish publications like New Matilda, The Monthly, The Saturday Paper and The Guardian Weekly kept on chipping away. The latter just had a magazine-makeover and a new cover price ($10.95), which might make you feel bad about reading it online (for free).

A friend recently shared an article on Facebook from Bauer Media’s The Monthly. Author John Birmingham waxed long and eloquent about Peter Dutton’s electorate and how alternative forces are plotting to overthrow the incumbent at the next election.

You might be able to read this here, though once I’d finished reading, The Monthly reminded me that I’d had my one free item and if I wanted more I’d have to subscribe. Well, I did once, for a few years.

Some of you will know that when someone shares a link to an article from The Australian (for example), you often can’t read it at all without being a subscriber. Many media companies use variations on the paywall theme. Some provide free articles (up to a specified number); some have free content and premium content.

Get used to this idea. Media organisations that opt for the paywall method will be on a subscriber drive, offering discounts, free gifts, vouchers and coupons and inducements like (trial) access to other titles.

So the Nine Fairfax merger is done and dusted, and with it went 144 back office, sales and support positions. Nine has pledged to honour the Fairfax code of editorial independence and thus far, no editorial jobs have been lost.

As Bill Ralston points out, it makes (commercial) sense for big companies to concentrate ownership of radio and TV stations, newspaper and magazines and online news outlets. They can offer better deals to advertisers and, by merging and consolidating, enjoy ‘synergies’ – shorthand for downsizing newsrooms.

Apropos the Nine Fairfax merger he makes a suggestion (which could also work in Australia), that the government-owned TVNZ ‘snaffle up the remnants of Stuff before the Fairfax papers die of exhaustion and thus, hopefully, reinvigorate both organisations’.

In Australia, a similar scenario could see the ABC ‘snaffle up’ the regional assets Nine don’t want and thus broaden the ABC’s remit from broadcasting into print and online newspaper publication.

This is an interesting proposition, given that the Australian Consumer and Competition Commission has just ruled that the ABC and SBS do not have an unfair market advantage over their commercial rivals.

In a busy year, the ACCC this week also released its preliminary report into the market power held by Google and Facebook.

Academics employed by Sydney University of Technology’s Centre for Media Transition analysed the ACCC paper. Derek Wilding and Sacha Molitorisz summarised the issues at stake, including $8 billion a year spent on online advertising revenue. This has happened at the expense of newspaper classified advertising revenue, which fell from $2 billion in 2001 to $200 million in 2016.

More than half of the annual online advertising spend went to Google and Facebook. And, as the ACCC notes, more than half of the traffic on Australian news websites comes via Google and Facebook.

One of the ACCC’s main concerns is the lack of transparency (consumers are not told how Google and Facebook algorithms work). The key concern is that we (the users) do not know how digital media platforms manage to target advertising with such uncanny accuracy.

Perhaps like me, you may have idly wondered how, after a private dinner conversation about bread makers, ads for bread makers start appearing in our social media news feed.

Toast, anyone?

Cancel my PO Box

Some of my rural readers have been writing impassioned letters about a troubling domestic issue (the rising cost of renting a PO Box).

“Dear Mr BobWords, (wrote Perplexed Pensioner of Reeseville)

“When we knew we’d be moving to Maleny, we applied for a PO Box. “When we arrived here on Dec 22nd, 1993, the post office was still in the old house on the corner of Teak St.

“They kept saying (once we presented ourselves in person), that there were no private mailboxes to spare, so we had “poste restante” status for quite a while. Once the new Riverside Centre post office opened, we were finally able to rent our new PO Box: the fee was $40 p.a. (1995-96).

“When I recently received the renewal notice for my standard P.O Box, I could see it was going to cost me $129. Frankly, it seemed a waste of a Pensioner’s Pittance. Australia Post offered a $5 discount if you paid before March 31^st (but nothing for pensioners!)

“So, after almost 24 years I have let go of my town lifeline.”

Yes, we hear you, Perplexed Pensioner. We decided there was not enough mail arriving in our private mailbox to justify the expense.

Ironically, when we inquired about getting a six-month mail redirection, we found that these rates too would rise on April 3.

When reviewing essential household mail, I discovered that 80% of our bills and official communiques arrive via email.

In line with similar issues facing postal services in all countries, revenue has been squeezed by online transaction services. Moreover, operating costs in this labour-intensive business (Oz Post employs 36,000 people), keep on rising.

As always, Australia Post is constrained by its obligation to offer postal services to all, no matter where they live.

Next time you gasp at the cost of posting a letter or parcel, Australia Post’s 2016 annual report confirms that losses for its regulated postal service over five years now total $1.29 billion.

Increasing the cost of letter postage from 41c in 1989 to $1 in 2017 does not seem to have done the trick.

Nevertheless, Australia Post returned a profit after tax every year between 2012 and 2014. Though producing its first after-tax loss of $221.7M in 2015, it was in the black again last year ($36.4 million).

Email rules – for now

If I had to mail this newsletter to FOMM subscribers, it would cost more than $500 per week, including envelopes, stamps, printing and labour. That would mean I’d have to pass the cost on to you, dear reader, market forces driving me to embrace the profit ethos.

Australia Post’s letter volumes peaked in 2008, according to its 2016 annual report. In the eight years since, volumes have declined by 41% per letterbox. We have seen this happen in our private mail box too.

Perplexed Pensioner referred us to a blog by Anny, a calendar-maker. She took Australia Post to task in 2014 and again this year for what she sees as price gouging, including a list of PO Box price rises compiled from her records of invoices (from $55 in 2004 to $129 in 2017).

While price increases in recent years have been well above average annual inflation, increases have been smaller since 2014.

“From February, Post Office (PO) Box prices increased by an average of 2.7% across the product range,” an Australia Post spokesperson told FOMM. “Like many businesses, Australia Post is operating in a challenging economic environment with increasing costs and competition.”

Local correspondent Little Bird says the cost of private mail boxes is a can of worms for the minority of Australians who do not have street delivery.

“Because we don’t have street delivery we pay a discounted rate, but I think it’s still a bit rich when everyone else gets their mail delivered for nothing.

“Also, since we live out of town it also means they won’t deliver parcels out here. The Australia Post-aligned couriers won’t deliver here either. (There are some which contract to Australia Post and some which do their own deliveries). So the sender pays a courier rate to have something delivered and it still goes no further than the PO Box.”

Australia Post responded: “Residents living in areas that receive a street delivery service less than once per week can collect mail over the Post Office counter for free. As PO Boxes are an optional delivery service (they), may be eligible to lease a PO Box at a reduced rate.”

Hefty price increases are not uncommon after government-owned essential services are corporatised or privatised.

So let’s be clear about one thing – Australia Post is still 100% owned by the Commonwealth Government. However, since 1989 (when, incidentally, a stamp cost 41c), it has been run as a Government-Owned Corporation.

It is run very much along private company lines – many of its post office shops are privately owned and along the way Australia Post bought its own courier service (StarTrack) to compete with rival courier services.

The Institute of Public Affairs has lobbied for the government to fully privatise Australia Post and found supporters in the Productivity Commission and the Australian competition watchdog (the ACCC).

There are examples aplenty of countries which have done so. Britain privatised the Royal Mail in 2013. Japan Post, which became a government-owned corporation in 2003, was privatised in 2007 and listed on the stock exchange in 2016. Deutsche Post was privatised in 2000.

Australia Post was ranked fourth in a survey of the world’s best postal services, interestingly led by the government-owned and operated US Postal Service

While Australia Post competes with the digital world by offering an array of electronic services, most people just want to post a letter, card or parcel to someone and trust it will arrive within the week.

So while we have cancelled our private mailbox, we can still rely on the humble postie delivering to our letter box. They deserve a medal, going out in all weathers, dodging swooping magpies, skateboarders and hostile dogs. We were given updated figures that show there are 11,000 ‘posties’ servicing 11, 240 postal routes around Australia. Motorcycles are used for delivery on about 6,000 routes, bicycles on 900 routes and about 900 intrepid posties walk their routes, all delivering to 11.6 million locations.

On a round-Australia trip in 2015, we encountered a group of 40 men and women riding 110cc ex-‘postie’ bikes from Brisbane to Adelaide via Birdsville and remote desert roads. Members of the group paid about $5,000 each for the privilege. The cost included an ex-‘postie’ bike, all accommodation and support while en-route and a flight home. Riders were encouraged to donate their bikes to Rotary at the end of the ride.

This seems a worthier use of energy than complaining (futilely) about Australia Post and its ongoing quest for profit. You could instead enjoy a vicarious few weeks experiencing much what it must feel like to be an all-weather ‘postie’. You could send postcards to your friends from every destination (at $1 a time), confident in Australia Post’s claim that it delivers 96.2% of domestic mail on time.