07-07-2015, 11:54 AM
IS CASA AN AUTONOMOUS SOVIET?
From Andrew Bolt by Nick Cater "The Australian".
Nick Cater says the ABC has become an autonomous soviet beyond the power of any government to make accountable and fair:
The government’s prerogative to overrule the ABC’s editorial decisions was removed from legislation in 1983. Since then, the ABC effectively has become a foreign country, outside the jurisdiction of the Commonwealth of Australia, save for the approval of its sizeable stipend. It enjoys power without responsibility which, as British Conservative politician Stanley Baldwin once remarked, was “the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages”.
So what, if anything, can a level-headed government do to ensure its annual billion-dollar investment is well spent? Should it try to wrest control of the state-owned station from the barmy bohemians who occupy it? Or should it just boycott their shows?
Would the appointment of a managing director with spine prevent, for example, the bussing of terrorist sympathisers from Parramatta to broadcast live to the nation? Not a hope if history is any guide. Malcolm Fraser went to war with the ABC in his first year of government but had run up the white flag by Christmas.
Bob Hawke settled for an uneasy truce. John Howard stacked the board with decent chaps who found themselves powerless to influence the corporation in any significant way whatsoever.
The iron law of culturally autonomous government-funded bodies is that they are far easier to set up than to close down.
From Andrew Bolt by Nick Cater "The Australian".
Nick Cater says the ABC has become an autonomous soviet beyond the power of any government to make accountable and fair:
The government’s prerogative to overrule the ABC’s editorial decisions was removed from legislation in 1983. Since then, the ABC effectively has become a foreign country, outside the jurisdiction of the Commonwealth of Australia, save for the approval of its sizeable stipend. It enjoys power without responsibility which, as British Conservative politician Stanley Baldwin once remarked, was “the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages”.
So what, if anything, can a level-headed government do to ensure its annual billion-dollar investment is well spent? Should it try to wrest control of the state-owned station from the barmy bohemians who occupy it? Or should it just boycott their shows?
Would the appointment of a managing director with spine prevent, for example, the bussing of terrorist sympathisers from Parramatta to broadcast live to the nation? Not a hope if history is any guide. Malcolm Fraser went to war with the ABC in his first year of government but had run up the white flag by Christmas.
Bob Hawke settled for an uneasy truce. John Howard stacked the board with decent chaps who found themselves powerless to influence the corporation in any significant way whatsoever.
The iron law of culturally autonomous government-funded bodies is that they are far easier to set up than to close down.