Gil reported in the Rage ( in the Hardie/ Lyons context) as saying it would be a good idea to withdraw media accreditation for falsehoods and that everyone should be accountable.
Would that accountability extend to the source of falsehoods peddled to the media or to withdrawing media accreditation for reporting facts unpalatable to the AFL?
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I’d love to believe it.
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This makes me want to burn things.
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So does this actually mean Fizpatrick, Demetriou and McLachlan will be required to take the stand and testify under the threat of perjury? Can any lawyers confirm? Sensational if it does, even if the press doesn’t cover it closely.
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Chip has an article on this on the Australian website now. Remember, Mick Warner was warned in 2013 if he wrote one more article favourable to Hird he would banned from the finals. He did and he was.
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Cut/paste pls?
Jackson Taylor and friends, take a bow.
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To be fair, that’s their focus and they’re very good at it.
The sporting stuff is a happy sideline.
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The hypocrisy is astounding. Here’ some choice quotes:
“I think there is responsibility everywhere. Whether it be our players, coaches, officials, everyone is held incredibly accountable everyday.”
“If someone is making things up that has such significant ramifications, there has to be an accountability for that”
“There is a responsibility to make sure you are right”
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What is Neil Young QC up to these days?
Here’s Chip’s article
AFL should stay out of the blackball game
CHIP LE GRAND
Victorian Chief ReporterMelbourne
@Melbchief
We should give Gillon McLachlan some benefit of the doubt.
Not long ago, the AFL boss took a nasty tumble on his pushbike. He had a helmet on but by all accounts, he hit the bitumen hard enough to knock a screw loose.
That said, what McLachlan has today proposed cannot be entirely explained by a bump to the head.
During his regular spot with Radio 3AW host Neil Mitchell, McLachlan was asked to respond to a suggestion made during the week by Collingwood coach Nathan Buckley that journalists who write or broadcast false stories should be stripped of their AFL accreditation.
Buckley was incensed by a claim made by 6PR broadcaster Brad Hardie that Fremantle coach Ross Lyon, through an intermediary, had let Collingwood know he was interested in Buckley’s job. Lyon denied the claim, describing it as erroneous, reckless and without foundation.
When Mitchell put the suggestion to McLachan, the AFL chief executive’s response was jaw dropping.
“I actually thought it was quite a good idea,’’ McLachlan said.
“There is a responsibility everywhere. Our players, coaches and officials, everyone is held incredibly accountable every day. We are also talking about people’s livelihoods and careers and this allegation talked to integrity.
“The thought that someone, if they actually just make something up that has such significant ramifications, I think there has to be an accountability for that and taking accreditation away seems to me to be a fairly logical outcome of that.
“I reckon it is worth looking at.’’
Let’s be clear what McLachlan is saying here. According to the AFL boss, anyone working in the media who writes or broadcasts false information could be stripped of their accreditation and denied access to games they are employed to attend.
Football writers everywhere will be hoping that McLachlan acknowledges the folly and danger inherent in this proposition.
Several points should be made.
The first is that the AFL is not qualified to be an arbiter of what is true and false in football.
Remember, this is the organisation whose previous chief executive Andrew Demetriou vowed to “go to my grave’’ on the knowledge that Essendon was not paying James Hird during his year of suspension. Demetriou was dead wrong; Hird was being paid.
Demetriou publicly ridiculed this reporter, on the Neil Mitchell program, for writing that the AFL had put a settlement offer to Essendon doctor Bruce Reid and was poised to drop a conduct unbecoming case against him. “Absolutely garbage, not correct,’’ Demetriou thundered.
The story was absolutely correct. A week later, the AFL dropped the charge against Reid and the case was settled.
These are merely my examples. Any journalist who writes about football long enough will have examples of their own. It is not always a case of an AFL official lying, although some certainly do. In the case of McLachlan’s mentor Demetriou, he simply didn’t know what was going on in his own organisation.
The second is that McLachlan’s notion is a classic straw man. Sports journalists rarely, if ever, make things up. We get things wrong but almost always, it is because we haven’t sufficiently checked something or relied on too few sources or the wrong sources or misunderstood information we’ve been given.
Brad Hardie isn’t a journalist. He is a retired footballer who makes a living as a radio personality. It wouldn’t have occurred to Hardie, as it would to any journalist, to go to Buckley and Lyon and their respective football clubs for comment prior to putting such a sensational claim to air. That doesn’t mean Hardie made it up. And Lyon’s denial doesn’t necessarily make Hardie wrong.
The third is that, just as the AFL holds to account executives who cannot keep their trousers on at work — although, this is something of a new direction under McLachlan — journalists and broadcasters are held to account by the media companies that pay their wages.
Failing that, there are defamation laws, press council and AMCA regulations and other legal restrictions on what can be reported.
It is worth remembering that as we read the sad tale of Chris Yarran and his ice addition, a Victorian Supreme Court order remains in place prohibiting any reporting of AFL players who have tested positive to illicit drugs under the AFL’s contentious “three strikes’’ policy.
The AFL hires its own football writers — more than any single media company — to report the stories it likes. Some journalists on the AFL payroll also provide content for commercial broadcasters.
If the AFL had its way, many important football stories would never be published. In this, they are no different from governments and large corporations. Yet, as far as we know, they are the only Australian organisation proposing to blackball journalists for what they write.
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The worst part in the 3AW interview with Neil Mitchell was when Gil said " …We are talking about peoples livelihoods and careers …"
(subtext 
we are talking about Bucks and Eddie doesn’t like it.)
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Ohman, I’m out of the saga loop. First visit in a year…I don’t even know who Jackson Taylor is? Too many posts to catch up. Kudos to those who still maintain the rage and energy.
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I have noticed a couple of things this year, one is that Patrick Smith went from a regular contributor to SEN to completely absent, not even part time as KB indicated shortly after his heinous article blaming James Hird for his own circumstances in relation to his hospitalization.
SWSNBN doesn’t seem to have said a bad word about Essendon this year and has even said some sweet ones (going by the headlines only without going the full clicks) since Rebel Wilson took Bauer Media to the cleaners over defamation and damages.
Obviously Fitzpatzprick disappeared not long after he was outed by Corcoran for telling him Hird would never work in the AFL industry again.
The notion of accountability seems to be catching on at AFL House as well since Richard Goyder became chairman, he is a serious businessman from WA who seems to have broken the Melbourne Old Boys Club mentality and this could be bad news for Gil with this court case looking set to proceed.
The tide had to turn eventually. I know it is asking a lot from 10th position on the ladder, but a significant amount of finals success would make the details of this court case bigger news.
Here’s wishing the boys well, James too - if only he could be presenting the Norm Smith to an Essendon player, there wouldn’t be a dry eye on this website.
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Ohman, I’m out of the saga loop. First visit in a year…I don’t even know who Jackson Taylor is? Too many posts to catch up. Kudos to those who still maintain the rage and energy.
Welcome back RTBC. Jackson Taylor is trying for a second time to get GIll, Mike “Round 20 1981” Fitzpatrick and the gang in the Supreme Court witness box to answer (in brief) whether or not they misled consumers regarding Essendon and the bullying of Hirdy through the Saga.
His first try folded through lack of funds. In his second he said he hoped he could afford it and things looked bleak, especially after the Court said he would have to post security moneys in case he lost. Now our reliable agitator Stabby has said Jackson has paid the security! This one is getting off the ground so get on board and tell your friends and enemies!
You can have a good look here http://files.ozblogistan.com.au/sites/4/2017/05/21170710/Amended-Statement-of-Claim-Redacted.pdf at what is reported as the redacted statement of claim and is also a very good summary of the ongoing disgraces.
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Thanks, 19th.
After much thought and research, my two points -
- any kind of ‘accreditation’ of media by anyone is farking ridiculous
- the media are farked anyway
- and so are the AFL
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What does accreditation get you anyway? Access to games and the post match interview.
Surely you could just watch from the comfort of your own lounge and write articles?
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Bennals: if the AFL internal records on the strategy and decision to target Hird Bomber Danny and Doc Reid are brought into evidence, such as the public release of charges and amended charges against them, including legal advice and discussions with the clubs, that would be revealing ( as would a full copy of the internal review),
Following the AFL internal review, Dillon was given more exclusive powers to run such charges, freer of interference from his more powerful bosses.
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that’s what kero wilson does.
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And access to players & coaches according to contracts signed with the AFL. So you are significantly behind without that guaranteed access. And then you are even more likely to make things up.