Appalled TV viewers in Britain have inundated the broadcasting regulator Ofcom with complaints, following blatantly racist comments by a mediocre black actress during King Charles’ coronation. The only surprise is that it wasn’t on the usual suspect, the BBC, but commercial broadcaster ITV.
ITV has been hit with 4,165 Ofcom complaints after Bridgerton star Adjoa Andoh prompted fury by calling the Buckingham Palace balcony ‘terribly white’ – making it the most complained about moment of the year.
Despite the overwhelming number of complaints, the broadcaster has maintained a wall of silence and refused to comment on the record figures released today.
Daily Mail
But ITV isn’t the only network being inundated with complaints about its dreadful coverage. It should surprise no-one that Australia’s taxpayer-funded leftist propaganda outfit is up to its usual tricks.
The ABC ombudsman will investigate whether the national broadcaster’s controversial coverage of King Charles’s coronation breached editorial standards, after the taxpayer-funded media organisation was deluged with more than 1000 viewer complaints about the way it handled the historic event.
The ABC’s coverage was widely panned for “misreading the mood” of its audience by focusing on issues relating to colonisation, the monarchy’s damaging effect on Indigenous Australians, and the republican movement, in the lead-up to the coronation church service.
The Australian understands that while the majority of the 1000-plus objections were from viewers who simply wished to express their “dissatisfaction” with the coverage, several complaints specifically registered concerns that the ABC broadcast had breached the media giant’s editorial guidelines.
One well-placed source said more than 1000 viewer complaints about any one program was “completely unheard of”.
The only problem here is that, yet again, the ABC is investigating itself — and we all know before it even does, what its conclusion will be. “Did we do anything wrong? Of course we didn’t. Done. Now, give us another billion dollars, plebs.”
Formal complaints of editorial failings are automatically investigated by the ABC ombudsman’s office, which must investigate the matter and report its findings and, potentially, its recommendations to the board, chaired by Ita Buttrose.
The Australian
I’m sure it will all be impartial and rigorously fair-minded.
Meanwhile, another Australian broadcaster is emulating the ITV approach: when you’re caught screwing up, just pretend it never happened.
Channel 10’s flagship prime time news and a current affairs program, The Project, has completely ignored the Sofronoff inquiry into the handling of the rape case against Bruce Lehrmann, despite the network being the first media outlet to air an interview with the complainant Brittany Higgins.
The weeknight show, predominantly hosted by Sarah Harris and Waleed Aly, last week did not make a single mention of the high-profile inquiry which has dominated newspaper front pages and TV and radio bulletins headlines all over the country since it began last Monday.
The issue here, of course, is that The Project was up to its neck in the whole Higgins saga. Text messages show that Higgins and her boyfriend deliberately used her interview with Lisa Wilkinson to politically embarrass the Morrison government. Then, Wilkinson’s bloviating, self-serving speech at the Logies almost derailed the whole trial, and at least caused the judge to delay it for weeks.
The Project’s failure last week to report critical developments in a story of significant public interest raises questions about the independence of its news coverage.
The Sofronoff inquiry has highlighted legal failings that may have prevented Mr Lehrmann from receiving a fair trial – a development that sits uneasily with the show’s support for Higgins.
Embarrassment, or cowardice, is seeing The Project fall uncharacteristically silent.
The Project is headed up by executive producer Christopher Bendall.
He did not respond to questions from The Australian, nor did Ten’s spokesperson, despite multiple requests for comment. The Australian also sought comment from Wilkinson about The Project’s lack of coverage of the ongoing story for which she won her Logie, but did not hear back.
The Australian
Which in itself is newsworthy enough: the first time in her life Wilkinson hasn’t wanted to talk about herself at excruciating length.
For which, I guess, we should all be thankful.