Ad nauseam! That’s the constancy of calls for the ABC to be shut down, privatised, or restructured. The first two calls are unrealistic, because any attempt to shut down or privatise the ABC would be lost in the High Court. Furthermore, there are some conservatives who also listen to the ABC. As to the call for restructuring, the intestinal fortitude to undertake such a task has been absent in prime ministers past and present. More on this later…

Calls by governments for the ABC to present balanced reporting and programming are ignored because the organisation has achieved the cultural status of untouchable. Some have come to believe it is out of control and answerable to no one.

The word untouchable has been applied, varyingly, to describe high-profile CEOs with star power. Such CEOs are considered to be figuratively bigger than the institutional shareholders and the corporations they run. Elon Musk comes to mind.

On November 29, 2023, Musk was interviewed at the New York Times DealBook Summit, during which he was asked about the loss of revenue from major advertisers who disagreed with some of the anti-Semitic statements posted by users on ‘X’, formally Twitter. In expressing his utter contempt for financial blackmail by advertisers, he used a word that left nothing to the imagination. Proof of his star power.

Like star CEOs, the ABC is capable of ignoring their institutional shareholders, the Australian taxpayers represented by their governments, because the ABC knows it is untouchable. Criticism by former Labor giant Bob Hawke, for example, was simply ignored.

Writing in The Weekend Australian, July 8, 2023, Gerard Henderson, director of The Sydney Institute, repeated the comments he has made on multiple occasions in the past:

‘Take the ABC, for example. For years I have argued that the taxpayer-funded public broadcaster is a conservative-free zone without a conservative presenter, producer, or editor for any of its prominent television, radio or online outlets. ABC management and journalists are wont to deny this. But no one has been able to name anyone who fits the bill.’

He also noted that the ABC ‘cancels’ conservatives whose views run counter to those of the organisation.

How did the ABC achieve such a status? Because no prime minister has had the spine to hold them accountable. The ABC’s often misguided criticisms of the Coalition means that Labor will continue its support for the public broadcaster. For their part, the Coalition’s laissez faire attitude towards the ABC is proof that conservative prime ministers lack the spine to take up the challenge to hold the ABC to account. John Howard’s Coalition government controlled both houses of Parliament in 2004, however, instead of bringing the ABC into line as part of legacy building, he focused on WorkChoices – an initiative he had to know, would not survive a Labor government. The iron law of laws: what one Act can bind, another can unbind. Witness the overhaul of the industrial relations regime including closing the loophole.

So what happens when an organisation ignores its shareholders because it is out of control? Institutional shareholders install a new CEO and board of directors to turn the organisation around. In the case of the ABC, it is government, albeit a Coalition one, that can turn the ABC around, through a restructuring – the third call.

A proper restructuring would ensure the employment of an equal number of presenters from the left and the right, from the Chairperson down. This would also apply to entities established under the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Act 1983. No single program would be the preserve of the left or the right, but would be presented, generally, equally by either side. A proper balance of personnel would enable the ABC’s directors to comply with their duties under s 8 (c) of the Act which, inter alia, is, ‘…to ensure that the gathering and presentation by the Corporation of news and information is accurate and impartial according to the recognised standards of objective journalism.’ Finally, the ABC should be required to table a quarterly report in Parliament, confirming the status of the balance in question. A proper balance would ensure the ABC catered to all Australians who pay their salaries – not just those on the left, who pay only a part.

A restructure of the ABC would be a teddy bears’ picnic compared with the challenge Margaret Thatcher embarked upon against the National Union of Mineworkers. Edward Heath’s conservative government was brought down, and Thatcher had conceded defeat in the first coal miners’ strike she faced as a new Prime Minister. Preparing to win the next strike, Thatcher planned her strategy, in the words of Neil Kinnock, ‘Like a military campaign.’ Coal was stockpiled at power stations to ensure continuous operations; a tough secondary boycott regime was introduced at power stations to keep them operating; and finally, disparate county police were transformed into a national force capable of expeditious deployment and control of protestors. Arthur Scargill called a strike on March 6, 1984. When the strike was called off on March 3, 1985, the striking coal miners were on their knees. Scargill never recovered.

The restructuring of the ABC into an organisation that provides news and information that is accurate and impartial, is infinitely less challenging than Thatcher staying the course on a strike that lasted about 360 days.

Out there, is a steel spine looking for a conservative Prime Minister.