"• Improve accountability of the media (Press Council). The media should be accountable to the public, including radio, television and media on the internet.The Government's response: " The Press Council is independent of government and reform should be driven by the industry."
• Improve media diversity and accountability.
• Expand the role of the Press Council to: Strengthen and reinvigorate the
professionalism of journalists;Improved accountability; Review roles of Press Council in light of new media."
The idea at the Summit seems to have been that the media needed to get its act together and that a media wide industry body might help. However according to Mark Pearson in The Australian the only reform likely is a slimmer Press Council with a narrower focus following a proposal by News for a 33% budget cut. This follows a month after the Council's chairman proposed an expanded role, and a 36% increase in funding.
Do any of these Press Council members represent bloggers such as yourself?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.presscouncil.org.au/pcsite/about/members.html
No,the Press Council, to now at least has been a print media body.In something I've read recently the chairman said that it now also covers on -line publications, so maybe they had or have in mind broadening membership to cover on-liners not connected to print publications as well.The Australian article suggests News Ltd,the biggest player in APC affairs has put a hold on any expansion plans.The lack of an industry wide media body is obviously a problem as the media argues issues such as improvement in shield laws and resists changes to privacy laws on the basis that everything is hunky-dory.Then there is the problem of definition of journalist-many don't belong to the MEAA for example-and how to distinguish some from the likes of us untrained, unprincipled bloggers.
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