Age of dissent by axed columnist

PROMINENT culture warrior Gerard Henderson has lashed Melbourne's The Age newspaper for left-wing bias after it dropped his column of 13 years without the courtesy of a call from the editor.

Henderson, a right-wing commentator and head of the Sydney Institute, said Age editor Andrew Jaspan "didn't have the courage to ring me, and the people who did ring me didn't tell me the truth".

"The whole thing was absolutely shambolic, unprofessional, incompetent and mendacious."

Henderson believes the decision to drop his column is a symptom of The Age lurching to the Left under Jaspan, who arrived eight months ago after editing The Observer in Britain, and The Scotsman and Sunday Herald in Scotland.

"My view is that if any of the previous editors had still been there, I would still be a columnist," Henderson said.

He said he had a written commitment from The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age's sister paper, that his column would remain a cornerstone of its opinion page, but he would not elaborate on any views expressed to him by Herald management about Jaspan's decision.

Henderson said he had been in the US when he was telephoned by The Age's opinion page editor, Mark Baker. He was told Jaspan had decided to discontinue the column because the page needed new voices. Instead, he had been replaced by another regular columnist, Tony Parkinson.

Henderson said Jaspan's decision would have dire ramifications.

"If he understood Australia and Melbourne, which he doesn't, he would understand you've not only got to have a balance in your paper but be seen to have a balance, because you want both sides of the political divide to buy it."