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Ray Martin under fire for speaking too soon on Q&A

ABC defends Ray Martin as Liberal Senators call for him to stand down from Q & A review.

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QANDA-gate rolls on with yet another new development.

No surprises that Ray Martin is now being criticised for speaking out too early on Sunrise yesterday.

Martin is co-chairing the review with former SBS boss Shaun Brown and is supposed to be independent. Yesterday he demonstrated he suggested critics of the show should have “A Bex and a good lie down.”

“I suspect Tony Jones was just as tough on the Labor government as he is on the Coalition right now,” he said.

Fairfax reports Coalition members said he should step down from the role.

Senator McGrath said: “I think he should step aside. His comments make him appear to be an apologist for Q & A rather than someone who will conduct an independent review.”

Senator Macdonald said: “Ray Martin has respect in the community but these comments make you question whether he is the right person to conduct an independent review.

“I think he’s probably disqualified himself from that role.”

Defence Minister Kevin ­Andrews told The Australian, “It is disturbing and unusual that someone conducting an ­inquiry would appear to comment on aspects of it before its conclusion.”

In a statement, ABC said, “Ray Martin is a widely-­respected journalist and broadcaster, viewed by the ABC and the community as being completely independent. He made clear today that the review he is conducting with the former head of SBS, Shaun Brown, would be based on a forensic examination of Q & A ­programming.”

17 Responses

  1. Before the Q&A boycott, there was the Alan Jones boycott. It was 2012 and the talkback king was under fire for telling the Sydney University Liberal Club that the father of then-prime minister Julia Gillard had “died of shame”. Tony Abbott, then opposition leader, described Jones’ comments as “wrong, unacceptable, offensive”. But when asked whether he would boycott Jones’ show, he said he would not. It was all about the numbers. “I am certainly not going to ignore an audience of half a million people in Sydney,” Mr Abbott said. Joe Hockey, then the shadow treasurer, agreed. It would be “the height of arrogance to say you’re going to boycott some sort of radio show that has an audience of 5, 6, 700,000 Australians”, Mr Hockey explained. According to the most recent Sydney radio ratings figures, Jones had a cumulative audience of 435,000 for the April to June survey period. His…

  2. “never set up an enquiry unless you know in advance what its findings will be.” (Yes Minister.) I believe that the public has already made up its mind about the Libs and no amount of “ABC bashing” will make a difference.

  3. #westandwithRayMartin #westandwithABC
    What the point to spend money on any inquiry and the government only expect the answer they want. We are not in N Korea or China or Russia right? #kickdictatorstupidoutofoffice

  4. It was stupid of Martin to say anything before the inquiry. The ABC will now have to replace him because he’s given the game away that he was picked to deliver a predetermined verdict. If the ABC is going to play its usual game of rigged “independent” inquiry by friends of the ABC, they have to at least keep up appearances.

    The Government was unable to exert pressure on the Dept. of Communication’s staff and as a result Abbott had to ignore its report. Now the ABC has handed the advantage back to Abbott.

  5. Amazing, that newspaper drawing a few days ago about not having any freedom of speech or opinion anymore since the Abbott government is becoming more and more real each day

  6. You are David. No surprises. In fact I was more than a little shocked that the usual suspects on this blog didn’t air their contrived grievances on this topic yesterday.

    However the silence would have been deafening had Ray stated something more akin to the libs narrow views 😐

    Having said that, and not calling into question Ray’s impartiality, I believe he made an error saying what he did yesterday. Yes, he was only stating what the majority of Australians believe to be true but it was only ever going to add fuel to the fire.

    1. Agree. Notwithstanding his ability to conduct a proper inquiry, it was definitely an error of judgment to give an off-the-cuff opinion about the very thing that he will be investigating. Trouble is, if this inquiry finds what every other inquiry has found, that the ABC / QandA is not a “lefty lynch-mob”, our Fuhrer and his cronies will just label Martin himself as biased and ignore the results of the report.

  7. This government is an absolute disgrace… always has been and always will be! It’s time to begin an inquiry into the Abbott Coalition over their blatant disregard for human freedoms!

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