A vigorous Fourth Estate

The standard of journalism in this country is often of concern. Our major news websites are little more than light entertainment. But all is not yet lost...

It is with a sense of great relief that I discovered journalism.org.nz today. In the words of Bernard Hickey:

Journalism.org.nz is a not-for-profit trust dedicated to supporting and building public interest news, analysis, comment and debate.

We aim to gather a group of supporters able to fund, build and flesh out a community of journalists and the platform they need to report, analyse and publish the news that matters. That means investigative, probing, enterprising and explanatory journalism, rather than celebrity-driven churnalism and PR.

New Zealand needs a strong and vibrant fourth estate that challenges, probes, questions and holds to account those people, institutions and forces that affect the lives of all New Zealanders.

Bloody brilliant!!!

Gordon Campbell

Gordon Campbell's latest blog post is on "the lack of context (and love of tears) in our news bulletins".

It includes this fantastic summary of the average news bulletin:

The average news bulletin consists of a series of talking heads standing in front of the latest footage of weeping crime victims/storms/plane crashes/war carnage punctuated by the day’s flying cat light relief, some exhaustive coverage of the weather …and a few clips of the latest sporting highlights, the latter presented with a lover’s confidence.

I particularly like the mention of the exhaustive weather coverage. If you are relying on the news for your weather report you are truly living in the 20th century.

He could have also mentioned the ridiculous advert for ASB Bank in the middle of the news which masquerades as financial news.

Additionally I love the fact that the screenshot I found of the news includes the caption "Cat-astrophe"!

Crap Journalism

The state of news journalism in New Zealand can be pretty damn poor at times and today we have this rubbish article from the NZ Herald, titled Govt cool on insulation extension. It says

The Government has not committed any new money to a housing insulation scheme despite reports showing it had provided $1.2 billion in health benefits - a four-fold return on its funding.

This seems incredible, how could the government be so short sighted on this issue! However the article continues

Housing Minister Phil Heatley announced last Thursday that the scheme had been so cost-effective that the Government could extend it for a year and help insulate 41,000 extra homes with the original budget. The funding was now expected to run out in July 2014.

Oh right! So the scheme will not run out until July 2014. The Government has over two years to decide if it wants to extend it.

Mr Heatley said through a spokesman that National would make any considerations on its future "in due course".

So rather than being "cool" on an extension to the scheme, the Government will look at in the two years it has until the scheme runs out. This article would have been better titled "Average Journalist writes crap article."

Cigarettes and Poor Journalism

It has been a couple of days between posts and this is one isn't particularly flash. Just a couple of articles from stuff.co.nz.

The Dom Post reports:

The government is to forge ahead with a ban on branded cigarette packets.

Woohoo!! This is fantastic news, smoking is disgusting and we all know smokers are morally deficient people. Bring on the day when the smoking of tabacco is banned outright in this country!

The second is from the Wellingtonian and is about Council staff earning more than $100,000 a year. It says:

It pays to work for Wellington City Council. Forty-eight council employees earn more than $100,000 a year. The average wage for Wellingtonians is just under $35,000.

This is outrageously poor journalism. Rather than reporting the news in an unbiased manner, the reporter (Emma Beer) is putting a slant on the story from the first sentence. She is also drawing a comparison between two completely different things.

When I was living in London it was a pleasure to grab a copy of the Guardian and indulge in some fine journalism. Unfortunately the standard here in New Zealand is slightly lower and this article is really scraping the barrel.