The retail giant Gerry Harvey is Australia’s biggest advertiser, eclipsing Woolworths and McDonald’s, so it’s no surprise newspapers hungry for advertising dollars love him.
Now Kerry Stokes’s new digital publication, The Nightly, has cosied up to its benefactor and interviewed Harvey at length about his dim view of Harvey Norman’s arch online retail rival Temu.
Harvey is just one of the billionaires who have supported The Nightly with their advertising might, along with the Mineral Resources founder, Chris Ellison, and Gina Rinehart.
“Harvey Norman chair Gerry Harvey says Temu is unlikely to survive, as quality over quantity will win out with consumers preferring to buy from trusted brands,” the Nightly reported this week.
Harvey’s interview was followed by several articles about Temu which highlighted allegations of child labour, poor quality and stolen data.
There was even an editorial backing Harvey’s fears. “If you’re paying $11 for a no-name garment steamer, you should probably be grateful if it doesn’t burn down your house, let alone if it manages to see out the month,” the editor in chief, Anthony De Ceglie, warned in his editorial.
Deegan learns the hard way
Many journalists cross to the “dark side” – public relations – when they leave daily news, often earning a much bigger pay packet than they did working as a mere hack.
But with the financial windfall comes some risk. If things don’t go well for your new masters, you may well be blamed.
Take Liz Deegan, a former editor of the Sunday Mail and deputy editor of the Sunday Telegraph, who was appointed executive director of public affairs for NSW police 11 months ago. The position reportedly pays between $320,000 and $360,000.
Deegan was blindsided this week when the NSW police commissioner, Karen Webb, dismissed her after a bad run in the press.
Webb faced criticism for referring to a Taylor Swift lyric in a media interview as she defended her response to the alleged murders of Sydney couple Jesse Baird and Luke Davies.
Deegan, who handled communications for News Corp and the NRL before joining the police, declined to comment.
Tredrea claim ruled out of bounds
Speaking of healthy pay packets, Channel Nine was paying the South Australian sport presenter Warren Tredrea $192,500 to present sport on Adelaide’s afternoon news, 6pm news and Nine News on radio station 5AA.
That was until Covid hit and the TV station limited access to its premises, allowing entry only to persons who were fully vaccinated.
According to court documents Tredrea refused to be vaccinated and was terminated by the media company a month later.
The former Port Adelaide captain and premiership player sued Nine for almost $6m in lost wages – and lost.
“Mr Tredrea was a controversial figure who was discussed in other media outlets in a manner that was unwelcome to Channel 9,” Justice Geoffrey Kennett said in his dismissal of Tredrea’s claim this week.
“Rather than having the studied neutrality of a newsreader, he was associated in public discourse with an unpopular viewpoint on an issue apt to excite strong emotions.”
Tredrea has been ordered to pay Nine’s legal costs but will be allowed to present a claim as to why he should not have to pay them.
Kennett said it was “at least awkward for one of its news presenters to have disappeared from his post in circumstances that appeared to have a direct connection with controversial comments that he had made and with responses to one of the most pressing issues facing the Australian community at the time”.
Peter Greste story gets film treatment
Production wrapped this week on The Correspondent, starring Richard Roxburgh, a feature film about the foreign correspondent Peter Greste, who was arrested in Cairo in 2013 while working for Al Jazeera.
Greste and two of his colleagues, Canadian-Egyptian Mohammed Fahmy and Egyptian Baher Mohammed, were charged with spreading false news and joining a terrorist organisation: the newly outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.
Greste, now a professor of journalism at Macquarie University, spent 13 months in an Egyptian jail.
The Correspondent is produced by a former foreign correspondent, Carmel Travers, based on Greste’s memoir The First Casualty, and written by Peter Duncan.
Stan goes missing on Hubbl
The Sydney Morning Herald, which is owned by Nine Entertainment, had a glowing review of Foxtel’s Hubbl this week.
“Too many streaming options? This new device could solve the problem.
“As you’d expect, Hubbl lets you watch all of Australia’s major streaming services including Netflix, Disney+, Amazon’s Prime Video, Apple TV+, Paramount+, Optus Sport, YouTube and Stan (owned by Nine, publisher of this masthead),” the review by Adam Turner said.
But Stan is not available on the platform yet, Foxtel confirmed to Weekly Beast.
We wonder if they would have published such a positive take if they knew Stan was not available on Hubbl as of this week?
Daily Telegraph leaves out the fine print
The “Teals have their own licence to print money” was the headline in the Daily Telegraph this week above photographs of independent MPs Kylea Tink ($87,000), Allegra Spender ($54,115) and Sophie Scamps ($54,000) and the amount they spent from their parliamentary printing allowance.
“Parliament’s most environmentally conscious MPs from affluent city suburbs are forking out thousands of dollars in printing, contributing to a shocking six-month $12m parliamentary printer’s bill,” the story said.
But a closer look at the data revealed the Liberal Jason Wood and Labor’s Peter Khalil were among the highest spenders, along with independent MP Dai Le, who spent $147,000. Wood and Khalil spent about four times more than the teals who were singled out.
At least Wood and Khalil appeared in the story, albeit at the bottom.
But the former Coalition communications minister Paul Fletcher, who spent $104,863 over the same period, did not warrant a mention.
The average spend on mailouts, newsletters and other commonly printed materials across the 227 parliamentarians was $54,625, so Scamps and Spender were right on average.
So why were the teals targeted by the tabloid? Because they were “climate conscious” and their electorates had “high levels of digital literacy”.
“But climate-conscious Teal Independents were also not shy of forking out thousands of dollars on printing despite living in electorates with high levels of digital literacy and running on a platform of saving the environment,” the news story said.
By that measure, Fletcher’s electorate of Bradfield on Sydney’s upper north shore, would certainly also qualify.
