Tova O’Brien almost matched Paul Holmes in her inaugural show on Today FM yesterday.
I say ‘almost’ because, where Holmes had a dramatic on camera walk-off by America’s Cup skipper Dennis Conner on the first Holmes show in 1989, O’Brien had to settle for New Zealand First leader Winston Peters hanging up on her.
Both Connor and Peters were gritted-teeth polite. Connor ended with “Thank you for having me”. Peters visited “You have a lovely day” on the host and it took a few seconds for her to realise he had gone. Continue reading “Refreshing ingredients in new breakfast menu”→
The proposal for a new entity to replace Television New Zealand and RNZ has two fundamental flaws that must be fixed if it is to gain the public’s trust.
The first flaw is the assumption that an existing legal structure – the Autonomous Crown Entity – is an appropriate form of governance. The second is that it has provided inadequate protection from political interference. The two issues are related.
Let me say at the outset that I support the restructuring of public service media. It is an idea whose time has come. It is an opportunity to create, almost from the ground up, a public organisation designed to live up to a digital incarnation of BBC-founder Lord Reith’s dictum that public media should inform, educate and entertain (now, however, in a creative and clever mix).
My concern lies in the need for this new entity to demonstrate from the outset that it will be free-standing and free from influence. By treating its formation little differently from a stock-standard Autonomous Crown Entity (ACE) into which existing organisations are dropped, the government is sending the wrong signals. From Day One (i.e., right now) it needs to be treated very much as a special case. Continue reading “Fundamental flaws in public media plans call for big fixes”→
Buried in an account of the removal of the protesters’ camp from the grounds of the New Zealand Parliament was a fundamental reason why professional journalism must continue to exist.
New Zealand Herald political reporter Michael Neilson was there last Wednesday when police moved on the camp and its occupants. He took the following day to reflect on events and in Friday’s edition he said: “And so I was there again among the protesters, with a handful of other journalists, as police looked set to clear the site once and for all, to bear witness as best we could.”
The incident was broadcast around the world: A Russian armoured vehicle on the streets of Kyiv “maliciously” crushing a car from which the driver “miraculously” emerged alive.
The tabloid descriptors went into overdrive, readily accepted by an audience already appalled by Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. It was a graphic illustration of the savagery of Russia’s unprovoked attack on its neighbour and a metaphor for the unequal battle being fought.
Then the Russian Embassy in Canada posted a screen grab of CBC News’ report of the incident but claimed it was a Ukrainian Armed Forces vehicle that had inflicted the damage “while hiding in civilian quarters in Kiev”. Both countries do, in fact, operate the Strela-10 short-range mobile anti-aircraft system.
This was followed by reports that it was a Ukrainian Strela-10 that had been seized by Russian soldiers who, dressed in Ukrainian uniforms, were carrying out a ‘false-flag’ sabotage mission.
Finally came an ‘analysis’ that, irrespective of the nationality, it was a tragic accident caused when the driver of the Strela-10 lost control on a corner of the road and went into a skid before hitting the oncoming car.
