It was quite the scene: a scowling, tracksuit-clad Alan Jones being hounded by media as he exited a Sydney police station on Monday, hours after being arrested and charged with 24 offences against eight alleged victims (on Tuesday two more charges were laid and the number of alleged victims rose to nine).
The former “king” of talkback radio was uncharacteristically silent as he was peppered with questions, including “Are you a sexual predator?”, “Will you be defending the charges?” and “Did you do it?”
Jones will reportedly be defending the charges. But it is nevertheless a spectacular downfall for a man once believed to be untouchable — a powerful demagogue who had the ear of prime ministers, as well as those of his loyal listeners.
As David Leser wrote in his Walkley-winning 1998 profile, “Who’s afraid of Alan Jones?”, Jones was, at his peak, among the most influential and feared people in the country. “To describe Alan Jones merely as the host of a radio talk program is to call the Hope diamond a bauble,” Leser wrote, noting that few of those he interviewed were willing to be named, fearing retribution.
The controversial teacher-turned-Wallabies coach-turned-shock jock always possessed a preternatural confidence. But it was when he entered radio in the mid-’80s that he became the Alan Jones to whom politicians kowtowed, capable of sinking leaders or swaying elections. His populist bluster saw him quickly become the most listened-to show in the country, taking his audience with him when he decamped from 2UE to 2GB.
Jones had friends in high places, from whom he demanded open loyalty. John Howard was a particular favourite — the former prime minister was known to get an easy run on Jones’ show, turning talkback into a key feature of his prime ministership. Fellow ex-PM Tony Abbott has referred to Jones as a friend, showing up to his final show in 2020 with champagne. Even Labor PMs felt the need to front up, though Julia Gillard rightfully refused his call following comments regarding her father’s death.
Jones was so powerful that, for a time, no scandal seemed to touch him — not the rumours of inappropriate behaviour from his teaching days, nor his 1988 arrest for “indecency” in a London toilet, both covered at length in Chris Masters’ Jonestown (a book the ABC pulled over fears it would “result in commercial loss”; it later became an Allen & Unwin bestseller). He survived the cash-for-comment scandal in ’99, and though the media watchdog found he incited vilification during the Cronulla riots, he carried on dominating ratings, while regularly being sued for defamation.
The increasingly vile things he said on air throughout the 2010s did start to slow him down, with comments about Gillard and former New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern leading to advertiser boycotts, often led by feminist group “Destroy the Joint”. But it wasn’t until 2020 that Jones “retired” from radio, while his Daily Telegraph column and Sky News show were cancelled in 2021, leaving him without a mainstream platform.
Jones has kept a lower profile since his “retirement”. But he still runs in powerful circles, despite Kate McClymont’s 2023 investigation into the allegations that had dogged him for decades (her report preceded the strikeforce that led to his recent arrest). As CBD reports, Jones on Saturday MC-ed a former Liberal MP’s 80th birthday hosted at a Darling Point mansion filled with powerbrokers, and on Thursday shared an Australians for Constitutional Monarchy stage with Howard and ex-NSW police minister David Elliott.
It remains to be seen whether the powerful friends in Jones’ so-called “pick and stick” club, including James Packer and Karl Stefanovic, will stick by him through this. Sky News Australia commentator Peta Credlin and former Liberal Party VP Teena McQueen have come to his defence, with Credlin declaring the allegations “entirely out of character with the man I’ve known.” But the silence from Howard and Abbott, who publicly defended George Pell through his criminal trial, has been deafening, a sign of Jones’ diminished power.
Even McClymont seems shocked by what has unfolded, calling it a “stunning development”, suggesting she never expected it to actually happen.
“To think that Alan Jones has actually been arrested is something that a lot of people will struggle to get their heads around,” she told Nine’s podcast, noting people were for years “too afraid” to take him on.
It is a travesty to think that it took until now, until Jones was without his powerful platform, for his alleged victims to feel safe coming forward, for those who turned a blind eye to quietly abandon him. But it appears his residual power cannot shield him any longer, with Australia’s most influential broadcaster about to find out how many friends he actually has.
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