Fear and loathing in Senate estimates

YOU′D be aware the managing director of the ABC, Russell Balding, didn′t turn up to face a Senate estimates committee hearing last week, an absence that generated a good deal of comment. Balding′s replacement, Murray Green, told the Senate: "Mr Balding is his own decision-maker. He′s not here and that′s all I have to say." By wide consensus, the most distressed of the politicians was Liberal senator Santo Santoro. This is immensely understandable, and Balding′s absence all the more regrettable, because Santoro had taken the trouble to carefully prepare 973 questions for Balding. Santoro seemed, later, to amend this to a possible 977. Either way, he might well have been understating the case when he said: "I feel quite frustrated he [Balding] isn′t here."

Santoro is, of course, an acclaimed media expert. Should anyone doubt it, they should trawl through some of his questions at previous estimates committee hearings. Potential doubters should particularly note an inherent insight always discernible in the good senator′s unforgiving interrogations. In any case, anyone who compiles 973 - or 977 - questions about anything is manifestly a person of substance. Yes, it′s the case that a Sydney Morning Herald columnist, Mike Carlton, referred to Santoro at the weekend as a "posturing twerp". But the scribe has been led to believe this may have been a typing mistake and the grapevine has it Carlton had had every intention of referring to the senator as a "potential titan".

It′s also the unfortunate fact that a columnist with this journal, Matt Price, has accused Santoro of indulging himself via an "absurd scrutiny" of the national broadcaster and of habitually making a great deal of Senate estimates committee fuss about very little. Happily, the scribe understands an acutely embarrassed Price has since conceded he was in serious error and is eager to make it known he′d meant to describe Santoro′s scrutiny of the ABC as "absolutely sensible".

Well, mistakes occur and people such as Price and Carlton wouldn′t be human if they didn′t occasionally make them. The scribe is disinclined to be too harsh. No one could sensibly want newspaper columns to be authored by infallible robots.

None of this, of course, goes anywhere near the central core of this matter. Why didn′t Balding turn up?

The scribe has, as you′d expect, given Balding′s Senate absence a very great deal of thought. The possibilities are endless. Could it, for example, have been that the managing director formed the view there was no necessity for him to attend? Yes, it′s a wild assumption, perhaps even bordering on irresponsible speculation. Yet it′s a theory that may deserve at least some minimal investigation. As the scribe understands it seven ABC executives were dispatched to the capital, albeit with Balding - conspicuously - not among them. Those persons making the trip and, so far as can be ascertained, delighted to meet Santoro and company, included the aforementioned Green (the corporation′s director of strategy and communications) and David Pendleton (its chief operating officer). John Cameron (director of news and current affairs) and Sue Howard (director of radio) went along too. Also in Canberra were Michael Ward (head of television policy and administration), Colin Palmer (director of human resources) and Colin Knowles (director of technology and distribution).

The question must obviously arise as to whether these people, individually or collectively, came even close to providing an adequate substitute for Balding. You may deem it a bit odd, given Santoro′s frustration at Balding′s absence, that the industrious senator may himself have come perilously - dangerously - close to providing an answer to that question.

Santoro told Green: "In the end, Mr Balding cross-references most of my questions to the operational people, of which I imagine you [the above named] are representatives."

No investigation is that neat or tidy and we should explore at least one other possible explanation. Could it be there are those who regard Balding′s primary function as running the ABC? Might he have been persuaded that sitting behind his desk in Sydney was time better spent than making himself a soft target for certain self-important individuals who view the ABC as an ideal platform from which to enhance their pitiful profiles? Could it be there are those at the ABC who′ve tired of trying to courteously assist inquisitors who are less interested in the ABC as intent on using Senate processes to play opportunistic games and hunt hyperbolic headlines?

Actually, the scribe should apologise for that last paragraph. On reflection, he′s almost as careless as Carlton and Price. What the scribe meant to write is that many politicians are desperately keen to assist the ABC, have its best interests at heart and regard it as one of the nation′s foremost institutions. Sorry.

While in penitent mood the scribe should also say, quite sincerely, that Santoro may have a point about the ABC′s use of "our" this and "our" that, an appellation Cameron has more or less tried to ban. It is, as you′d know, more prevalent on commercial television where newscasters and presenters invariably speak of "our weather", "our roads", "our kids" and so on. They probably do it in that weird certainty, peculiar to television, that it′s viewer-friendly. To the scribe′s mind it′s twee. But whether it′s crime enough to justify Santoro wading through miles of transcripts to try to prove the ABC has broken the Our Rule close to 500 times since March 2003 is another matter. Some might say it′s a shame he doesn′t have more pressing matters to attend to. Ironically, as Cameron revealed during subsequent questioning, the rule came into being only to try to stop sports presenters referring to "our Cathy", as opposed to plain old Cathy Freeman. The path to Senate outrage appears to have been strewn with good intention.