I have not watched the ABC

for many years. By "ABC" I mean Downunder's ABC, our supposed equivalent of the BBC, not the United States' ABC.

There was a time when the Senior Cat would turn the television set on at about a minute before the 7pm news and then we would watch. For many years, or so it seemed, the person who read the news each night was John Ovenden. He was the best newsreader around, by far the best. As I remember him he is possibly the best I have ever known. He had an outstanding speaking voice, well suited to the BBC World Service for whom he also worked at one time. 

These days he has retired comfortably into the hills behind me. He has written a couple of plays and no doubt does other useful things in his "retirement". He would be that sort of person. 

What really needs to happen is for him to be pulled out of retirement and given the task of teaching this generation of news readers and reporters how to do their job. My grammar is far from perfect - and yes I do know about those "split infinitives"! That said I picked up no less than three grammatical errors on SBS last night. There were also errors in the news stories. 

I have come to expect errors. SBS is particularly prone to them, perhaps because of translation issues. It is supposed to be an international news source. Things do get lost and mislaid in translation. The general gist of a story however is usually there. I can make sense of it. The bias is obvious. "Political correctness" is everything. SBS material tends left, even far left at times, rather than right. SBS made no secret of support for the referendum on the "Voice". The bias was not subtle and it is often not subtle at other times but this is to be expected. It is part of the charter under which SBS works.

The ABC should be different. It has a legal responsibility to present the news without bias. It fails to do this and it fails miserably. I have not seen the footage but apparently the sound of gunfire was added to a story. Allegedly? I asked the question but no, it has been admitted. The only reason to do something like that would be in order to suggest something which was not true. 

All this came up last night when someone called me about another issue and the conversation veered off into that direction. "And did you know X... was considering running at the next election?" No, I did not know that one of the ABC journalists was considering running for parliament. It did not surprise me. More than one person has gone from the ABC to politics -  and been the partner of someone heavily involved in politics. It is almost inevitable that any strong political bias will influence their reporting. 

This time however even the ABC has gone too far. There have been questions asked in places where questions should have been asked much earlier. It is going to take much more than a rap over the knuckles to alter behaviour there. I doubt that anything much will change. The present team is too useful to the government eight months out from an election.

It is a good reminder to try and keep getting my news from a variety of sources - but I can find alternatives to the ABC.