Latest report from the ACMA’s Citizens Conversations Series.
Last week, the ACMA held one of its Citizens Conversation Series forums on decency and how ambiguous one word can be in broadcasting codes and statutory regulations. This week, the third forum in the series looked at another ambiguous word, ‘accuracy’, particularly within a news and current affairs context.
The principal debate revolved around journalistic practices and the accurate reporting of facts. Despite a strong focus on TV news and current affairs programs in the forum, the principal concerns also affect radio, because established frameworks can also be used to solve similar ambiguities found within radio broadcasting.
The first problem identified was the use of the term ‘accuracy’ and how it varies between the different broadcasting codes for each licensee. For example, under the Commercial TV Industry Codes of Practice, licensees must “broadcast factual material accurately” whereas the ABC Codes of Practice requires only “that reasonable efforts must be made to ensure accuracy in all fact-based content”. A biggest problems with these terms was how the ACMA is meant to determine whether a licensee is in breach of its code as ‘accuracy,’ and that ‘reasonable efforts’ are not expressly defined. This was the basis for much of the debate between panelists: what facts need to be reported accurately (all, peripheral or only central facts to a story) and what would be considered a reasonable effort to check sources – was the testing absolute or substantial?
It was noted that only factual material and not opinion material is covered under broadcasting codes, but the issue was raised over whether opinion pieces should also be included, especially when they can be made to look or be broadcast as factual material.
Although the panel agreed that opinion pieces aren’t just ‘free fire zones’ as this notion implies, the panel did consider the need for opinion pieces to be scrutinised in some way, because consumers believe opinion pieces to be based on a fact. Jonathan Holmes, presenter of the ABC TV program Media Watch supported this assumption believing that ‘opinion’ shouldn’t be a justifiable response to misrepresentation and said: “just because you express an opinion, doesn’t mean you can misrepresent the facts”.
Professor Julian Disney, Chair of the Australian Press Council, spoke mostly about the fact vs opinion debate as press media came under fire due to its frequent publication of opinion pieces. He expressed the idea that opinion shouldn’t come under scrutiny and that “we need to remember that fact and opinion is a spectrum not a dichotomy”.
A member present at forum noted that whilst opinion is free, facts should be accurate and dealing with this in practice is a matter of judgement. Chris Willis, News Director of Channel Seven’s Sydney newsroom also explored this idea of ‘judgement’ within the scope of the pressures of commercial TV. His view was that making snap judgements in relation to content to broadcast was frequent in commercial newsrooms as it’s in their business interests to broadcast breaking news. However, he indicated sometimes when under this pressure, it is impractical to conduct further source research as news reports are on strict deadlines.
The other issue Willis raised was how social media increases the pressure on commercial TV newsrooms to act fast, as news is often first broken on sites like Twitter before making it into new bulletins. Sometimes this gives the impression that TV newsrooms aren’t “on the ball”.
Another issue raised related to the lack of training of young journalists and how this can lead to misrepresentation and inaccurate reporting. The commercial networks present at the forum worked together in looking at this issue, but often came into contention with the academics present. Willis explained that whilst Universities can offer credible courses, the experience of reporting is something that can really only be learnt whilst on the job and from making mistakes. He also made many other important statements including “news is run by humans and humans make mistakes” and that sometimes snap judgements are made by the most senior of journalists and they can be wrong.
The ACMA’s General Manager of Content, Consumers and Citizens, Jennifer McNeill clarified that, as long as “all efforts are made but there is a mistake in reporting, it’s not considered a breach”. This statementclarified ACMA’s view on what is considered reasonable steps to achieve accurate reporting.
What radio managers can take out of this forum relates to broadcasts of news and current affairs, by both designated news presenters and other announcers in statements they air.
The discrepancy between commercial and public service ‘accuracy’ codes is a relevant issue for the radio codes, in that the standards are much stricter on commercial radio. The reporting of news in radio comes under the same scrutiny as the TV examples given in the forum. The ultimate decision of what is put to air and what doesn’t, is one of judgement to be made based on circumstances and the relevant credible facts and sources supporting the facts.
Willis reminded the forum that he believes the first principle any journalist should learn is, “when in doubt, leave it out”. A simple solution to this complex problem perhaps, but the issue of what happens when something turns out to be incorrect still remains, as often facts can be honestly held, but also inaccurate.
The same problem apparent in the decency forum was the biggest problem raised by participants in today’s forum – Codes are restrictive. Whilst the journalists present also noted that they accept the codes as a framework, they are also concerned that the ambiguity of words makes it harder to decide on which content to air, slowing down the business process of news gathering. Their opinion was generally that future guidelines shouldn’t be more restrictive, but rather more realistic. Again, we see the big issue within the codes being around ambiguity of words that are too hard to justify, although a start could be establishing what we believe accuracy is and how should it be measured or means tested.
The ACMA is inviting submissions for an issues paper on this topic. For more information visit the ACMA website.